You Were Conceived Next to a Tortoise Enclosure
by oddline
Summary: Unrivalled in its ability to drive even the most pacifist club members to violence in ten syllables or less, the Teiko Mascot also comes equipped with unfiltered profanity, a severe height complex, and corkscrew curls. Occasional glimmer of insight subject to terms and conditions. (Aomine/OC)
1. Prologue

**You Were Conceived Next to a Tortoise Enclosure**

**Disclaimer: **I wish!

**Prologue**

Their first meeting was anti-climactic, but then that's usually how first meetings go. It is rarely an accidental stumble into open arms, or dropped groceries on cement pathways, hardly ever fingers touching over the last CD of an obscure rock band that no one else appreciates until they are appreciated and then they're just sell-outs because they've totally changed their whole style and- I digress. In summary, their first meeting was pretty shit as far as first meetings go.

"_Tetsuuuuyaaaa_."

"Please don't yell, Kame-san, your voice echoes," said Kuroko, attempting another shot.

Tsukino, who was sprawled out on the floor beside the hoop, lifted her head up to watch, her eyes partially obscured by wavy locks of black hair. The ball bounced off the rim and rolled pathetically out of sight.

"_Oooooh, and it's another miss for Kuroko Tetsuya_," she exclaimed, returning to her resting position. "Let's go already Tetsuya, I'm bored."

"You could always practise with me," said Kuroko.

"What for?" Tsukino said, rolling onto her back. "I'll just embarrass you."

Kuroko pointed another one of his penetrating blank-faced stares at her. "Prove it."

"Ah well, um, you see I would love to but I gotta reserve my energies for tonight."

"What's happening tonight?"

"Y'know, this and _that._"

Picking up the ball, Kuroko dribbled it up and down the court before attempting and failing another shot.

Though to an outside observer his face was expressionless, Tsukino, having known him since childhood, could tell that he was getting irritated.

"You're entering dangerous territory, Kame-san. Promise me that you'll rethink your decision."

"Nope."

"Kame-san-"

Tsukino let out an obnoxiously loud yawn and kicked up into a standing position. "Look, if you're going to be a brat about it, then I'll leave."

All of a sudden something bright orange and blurry came whizzing towards her. Tsukino threw both her hands up and just managed to catch the ball, the impact knocking her back a few steps.

"What the hell!" she shouted, thrusting it back at Kuroko.

Back turned to her, Kuroko made a show of ignoring her existence.

"See, _that_ is the definition of brat-AH!" exclaimed Tsukino, leaping out the way as the ball came hurtling towards her again. She was about to fist pump her triumph when it ricocheted off the wall and hit her head. "Ouch," she muttered, rubbing her skull. "Jerk."

Kuroko kept his back turned as if he had no idea what had just happened.

Kicking the ball into her hands, she inspected it curiously. "Hey, I think I'm starting to get it."

Kuroko deigned to glance at her.

"What that red head, what's his name, Aka-something, was saying."

Now Kuroko was watching her with an almost jaded look in his eyes, as if he didn't believe her capable of deducing what the mighty first-string regular had alluded to. Which she wasn't.

"You can stand in the crowd and throw things at people."

"Please stop talking, Kame-san."

"Fine, be patronising about it. From now on I'll just keep my opinions to myself,"said Tsukino, carelessly flinging the ball over her shoulder with a smirk.

Kuroko's eyes followed its trajectory, his expression remaining blank as it bounced off the hoop.

"That was embarrassing."

"Shut up."

The doors to the gym swung open and a young man with blue hair rolled in. At first, he didn't notice the two friends having a silent stand-off and dropped his bag on the floor, proceeding to stretch in the corner.

"Good evening."

Aomine Daiki swung round in surprise, still not used to the shadow man's lack of presence.

"Yo, Tetsu," he said, grinning upon realising who it was. "Still at it?"

"Yes," said Kuroko, a determined look in his eyes. "I'm having trouble trying to figure out how I can be useful to the team."

The young girl raised her hand in the air. "Ooh, I know this one."

Both boys looked at her, Aomine raising his eyebrow curiously.

"Stay away from them," she said. "Trust me, they'll be grateful."

"I'd be grateful if you stayed away from me," said Kuroko.

Tsukino stuck her middle finger up at him.

"Who're you?" Aomine asked blankly.

Noticing the highly affronted look on Tsukino's face, Kuroko decided to interject. "This is Tsukino Kame. You two are in the same class."

"Eh? Really?"

"We were even paired up in the first term for a history project," said Tsukino, her shoulders slumping.

"It's because you have a forgettable face, Kame-san," Kuroko said matter-of-factly.

"Oi, Tetsu, don't say that," Aomine whispered sharply. Rubbing the back of his neck, he turned to Tsukino with an apologetic smile. "I'm just really bad at remembering stuff."

Forlorn, sunken eyes stared back at him. "You came round to my house once."

Kuroko slipped away and went to retrieve the ball that had rolled behind the hoop.

Aomine's brow furrowed. "What? Seriously? I swear I would have remembered-"

"We made sweet, sweet love."

"We made….? UWAH!? What did you say?"

"You were very tender."

There was silence.

"You're screwing with me," he said.

Her face split into a wide toothy grin, eyes disappearing into slits. Aomine instinctively recoiled. It was quite a frightening sight; Mama Tsukino often likened it to a lion baring its teeth, while her older brother disagreed and said she looked more like a constipated old woman whose dentures were about to pop out.

"I apologise on Kame-san's behalf," said Kuroko, appearing of nowhere beside Tsukino. "She has quite a lewd sense of humour."

"At least this way he's unlikely to forget the name Tsukino Kame," said Tsukino, folding her arms across her chest haughtily. It would have been highly fitting had she suddenly burst into a villainous guffaw.

"Do you even know his name?" asked Kuroko.

Cue tumbleweed moment.

"Of course I do." She tapped her finger against her lips. "Ao… Ao…"

"Aomine Daiki!" spluttered the man in question.

"Aomine Daiki!" Tsukino exclaimed with a snap of her fingers, as if it had just come to her. "Told you I knew."

"Go home, Kame-san."

"Yep."

Sprinting off towards the entrance, she gave them a half-hearted salute and disappeared out of the double doors.

One thing was for sure, Aomine Daiki never did forget her name after that. It was pretty hard to considering how she managed to pop up everywhere. Like mould.

* * *

**Author's Note:**

It was lying around and I figured what the hell. I need to write me some light-hearted humour.


	2. The Tortoise

_A/N: Thanks to to all the readers out there! Also thanks for all of the reviews, alerts and favourites. I hope you enjoy this chapter._

**You Were Conceived Next to a Tortoise Enclosure**

**The Tortoise**

Tsukino Kame.

A name full of love.

An amalgamation of different versions of love.

And every version grossed her the hell out.

The day that her older brothers revealed that the real reason behind her name was most definitely not that she was named after a combination of Mama Tsukino's favourite characters Tsukino Usagi and Tuxedo Kamen, was perhaps the day it all started to go terribly wrong.

"You named me after a tortoise, so I'm going to move _really_, _really_ slow," said seven-year-old Kame, staring wide-eyed and pursed lipped at her mother as she dragged her pen with excruciating slowness across her homework sheet. "I'm never gonna do anything quickly ever again."

Mama Tsukino had smiled and placed a bowl of ice cream in front of her. And it was finished in a matter of seconds.

"You named me after a tortoise, so that means I can stay in my room all day," said nine-year-old Kame, balling herself into her covers so that only the top of her head could be seen. "I'm never coming out! This is my home now! THIS IS MY LIFE!"

Again, Mama Tsukino had smiled and placed a bowl of ice cream at the bottom of the stairs. And it was finished in a matter of seconds.

"You named me after a tortoise," said eleven-year-old Kame, glaring at her brother as he clutched his finger to his chest and wailed. "Tortoises bite. BAAAAAAAAAAAAH!"

Again, Mama Tsukino had smiled, but this time she placed a _tub_ of ice cream in her son's hands and said that he was in charge of it until further notice. Mama Tsukino could be a devious witch when she wanted to be.

"I'm going out," said thirteen-year-old Kame, disappearing out the door.

And, Mama Tsukino had smiled and placed a bowl of ice cream on the table.

But in the morning when she came down, the bowl was still there and all the ice cream had melted.

* * *

Book in one hand, eyes still focused on the text, Kuroko Tetsuya lifted his leg up and delivered a swift kick to the lump under the covers. There was a moan, some movement, and then stillness. Kuroko raised his leg again.

"I'm up, you bastard," came a voice from under the covers. "I'm also naked. Want to take a look?"

Tucking his book into his shoulder bag, Kuroko grabbed a corner of the quilt in each hand and swept it back. Tsukino lay curled in the foetal position in the centre of the bed, eyes scrunched tightly as if by not looking at him she made it so that he didn't exist.

"I'm relieved you're wearing clothes," said Kuroko.

"Not for long if you don't give that back!" said Tsukino, trying to claw back the covers. Kuroko merely inched away until she was stretching over the edge of the bed at him, swiping the air, reluctant to leave the warmth of her bed.

"If you're not changed in ten minutes, Kame-san, I'm going to throw it away."

As Tsukino furiously started unbuttoning her nightshirt to make good on her threat, Kuroko bundled the quilt under his arm and headed towards the ladder leading down from the attic.

"AHAH!"

She ripped open her nightshirt and exposed her naked chest, a look of triumph burning in her eyes. Except Kuroko had already left. Well, it wasn't like anything had changed since the baths they used to take together when they were small. Mama Tsukino kept reassuring her that she was a late bloomer, like her, but Tsukino had long since given up on inheriting her mother's cup size, or anything else from either parent for that matter.

Having grown up surrounded by redheaded giants, naturally she, with her black hair, thin brown eyes, and below average height, was the odd one out. Even Shiro, who was only six months old, was growing at an unprecedented rate.

Rolling out of bed, Tsukino started collecting the discarded articles of her school uniform, which had been rotting in her room since the beginning of spring, and changed into them as fast as she could. Sniffing an armpit, she nodded her approval and climbed down the ladder, dropping onto the second floor landing.

"Is that you, Kame-chan?"

The house echoed with the wails of the newest and most unexpected addition to their family as he demanded succour from their mother's ample breasts. Tsukino sped downstairs before Mama Tsukino could see her and rope her into diaper changing or spit up duty. By the look of the shoe rack her older brothers must have had the same idea. It appeared the new baby had exponentially improved the timekeeping abilities of all the males in the family. Tsukino being a rebel would not be cowed so easily and continued to be tardy on principle.

Glancing at the family portrait hanging in the entrance hall, Tsukino made a face at her twelve-year-old self standing in the centre like a puss oozing sore-thumb. Really, the only thing that tied her together with her brothers was the curls. They all shared the same corkscrew curls that seemed to withstand almost anything, be it rain, wind, snow or straighteners. In a fit of prepubescent rebellion, Kame had shaved her head clean during the summer before entering junior high and had kept it short ever since.

Walking past the downstairs toilet, she heard a high-pitched, slightly hysterical hum emanating from it. Younger brother Saburo, who didn't start school for another week, had apparently locked himself inside again to hide from the sight of their mother openly breastfeeding. Sighing, she thumped the door. There was a squeal and splash from inside that she prayed wasn't him falling into the toilet... again.

"You know everyone thinks you're touching yourself," said Tsukino.

There was a groan.

"Making sounds like that doesn't help your case, Buro."

From the kitchen, she heard Papa Tsukino say something about needing to buy more milk, but crawling on her hands and knees, she managed to sneak out the backdoor without being seen. The lady who lived next door was in her garden pruning the hedges and seeing Tsukino kneeling in the dirt, she shot her a disapproving glare.

The lack of resemblance between Tsukino and her siblings often raised statements from the neighbours; 'she must be adopted' or 'Mama Tsukino probably fooled around with the milkman'. In response, the unruly child would often knock over their garden gnomes and pee on their flowers with surprising accuracy considering the anatomical disadvantage.

With a nasty grin, Tsukino flipped the neighbour off and earned herself a look of scandalised outrage.

Kuroko was already halfway down the street when she caught up with him, nose still buried in one of his stupid books. She pulled her fist back and aimed a punch at the back of his head.

"If you do that, you will never see your quilt again, Kame-san."

And so began their second year of Teiko Middle School.

* * *

"Are you joining any clubs this year?" Kuroko asked her as they walked around the quad.

The calm expression on Tsukino's face was rapidly deteriorating as more and more fliers were thrust in her face, unheeding of the twitch in her eye.

"Not if I can help it," said Tsukino, slapping the hand of a senior recruiting for the lacrosse team.

In Teiko, the first day of the year was usually apportioned between the opening ceremony, club sign up and try-outs. For some reason, Kuroko had used his leverage to force her to attend the opening ceremony and was now dragging her through the quad where all the club representatives had set up their stands, perhaps with the misguided hope of socialising her and turning her into a valued member of the school. Maybe he was high.

"You know the girls' basketball club is holding try-outs right now-"

"I'd rather die."

Kuroko shut his book. "You're going to have to make up with Oshiro-san one day."

Tsukino nodded. "The day I die."

"Kame-san, you're being childish."

"On my deathbed, as I lay shrivelled and weak, I will call her to my side and I will… nope I'll spit in her face. And then, with my last breath, I will curse all future generations of her line to fart uncontrollably in public."

"Did your TV break again?"

"Two weeks ago."

Kuroko ducked out of the way just as a girl swung her arm to clap Tsukino on the shoulder. She must have been someone Tsukino had met before because she was staring at her with a formidable expression. Looked like this one wouldn't be so easy to shake off.

"Tsukino-san," said the girl. "I ask again, please consider joining the Swim Club."

With a frown, Tsukino watched as Kuroko's already weak presence was swallowed up by the crowd of students. When had he become so unabashed about abandoning her? Then she recalled how she had spent the entire walk to school describing in detail the various ways she would use her quilt to end his life when she got her hands on it again.

"Your broad shoulders, muscular arms and streamlined chest make you a perfect contender."

Tsukino blinked at the girl in front of her. "I feel like I've just been insulted somehow."

"We've been watching you for a while," said the girl, hands on both shoulders now, steely gaze unwavering. "And despite your delinquent background we would be honoured to take on the lofty task of rehabilitating you through the power of determination and friendship. Our uniform is also very cute."

"You're really skilled at the backhanded compliment," Tsukino said, genuinely in awe of the girl.

"Thank you," said the girl, nodding her mutual respect. "For a delinquent you are unexpectedly astute at recognising such nuanced methods. Were you to join the Swim Club, I would also extend my services as a tutor to assist in bringing your grades up so that you have a chance in hell in the future."

It was strange, but Tsukino had the wild, masochistic urge to make friends. It was starting to make sense why she was so fond of Kuroko. And formerly Oshiro.

"What's your name?" asked Tsukino.

For the first time in their encounter, the girl seemed to falter. "My name is Sakata Riyeko. We're in the same class, Tsukino-san. I sit behind you."

"We never did a history project together did we?" asked Tsukino, quickly scanning the quad for a sign of dark blue hair, eyes narrowing. "Where I came over to your house, we made sweet, sweet love and I was very tender."

She wouldn't put it past Aomine to come up with such an obvious prank, although it would have been pretty bold of him to try something now. After what happened when they ran into each other at the canal during spring break, she imagined he'd want to steer clear of her for the next hundred years. Who would have thought Aomine Daiki was so protective of his crayfish? She still had to make him pay for that.

"I'm sorry," said Sakata. "Being that I am only interested in the opposite sex, that scenario is impossible. However, if you are trying to place me, I did lend you a pencil for a test once, which you never returned. Again, if you were to join the Swim Club, Tsukino-san, you would have your pick of pencils. Would you like one now? I have several."

Reaching into her bag, she took out a pencil and presented it in both hands to Tsukino.

"Oh my."

"It's Parrot King," said Sakata, "which is a very expensive and prestigious brand used by sketch artists. I think you will enjoy balancing it on the tip of your nose during class like a trained seal."

"I think I'm in love," said Tsukino, taking the pencil and twirling it between her fingers.

"I reiterate. I am only interested in the opposite sex, although I am admittedly flattered. You are not unattractive."

"Did they build you in a factory?" Tsukino asked, leaning forward and peering closely at Sakata as if she might find a Made in Taiwan stamp concealed beneath the bangs of her fringe. "You're very lifelike."

"Tsukino-san," said Sakata, an earnest fire in her eyes. "Do I have your consent to add you to the Swim Club's mailing list? You may write your name down with your new pencil, which I have just gifted you."

Opportunities like this rarely arose for Tsukino in this school, where most people steered clear of her, and she wasn't about to squander it by telling Sakata-san something so trivial like how she couldn't actually swim.

"First, I have a condition."

This time Sakata took out the entire pack of Parrot King Pencils from her bag, evidently prepared, but Tsukino waved her off, throwing an arm over her shoulder and dragging her into step with her.

"How good would you say you are at climbing trees…?"

* * *

A shiver ran up the back of Aomine's spine as they walked through the hallway towards the gymnasium. What was that saying, that feeling as though someone had just walked over your grave? He tried to shake it off.

"Something wrong, Aomine-kun?" asked Satsuki.

Satsuki had insisted on going to watch the try-outs for the basketball team this year because she wanted to start her data collection packs for the newbies right away, to see who would rise through the ranks or alternatively need to be thinned from the herd. As usual, he had been dragged along against his will.

"Guess not," said Aomine, clasping both hands behind his neck, a puzzled look on his face.

As they entered through the gym's double doors, Aomine bumped shoulders with someone standing on the side and raised his hand in apology. He almost leapt out of his skin when he realised who it was.

"Aomine-Kun, Momoi-san," said Kuroko, nodding at them both.

"Tetsu, you're here to watch the try-outs as well," said Aomine, sheepishly rubbing the back of his neck. He didn't think he'd ever get used to the guy popping out of nowhere, although he was a little proud of himself for not screaming this time.

"It's good to see you, Kuroko-kun," said Momoi, smiling a little too brightly. "How was your spring?"

As they talked, Aomine saw that Satsuki was just as embarrassed as he was for not recognising the recent addition to the team. In their defence, the only person Aomine knew of that was immune to his lack of presence was…

Scanning the gymnasium, Aomine looked for the familiar shock of curly black hair that usually accompanied Kuroko, the earlier feeling of dread resurfacing.

"Kame-san is deathly afraid of the captain," said Kuroko, having sensed what was troubling him. "She won't show up here, so you're safe Aomine-kun."

Aomine's shoulders visibly relaxed and Momoi looked between the two boys curiously.

"Kame-san?" she asked, unfamiliar with the name.

"That girl in my class I was telling you about," Aomine said darkly. "Tsukino."

"Aomine-kun pushed her into the canal over spring," Kuroko dutifully explained.

"It was an accident!"

Momoi gasped. "_Aomine-kun!_"

"She kept trying to steal my crayfish and I must have used too much force," said Aomine, bristling under Satsuki's undeserved scrutiny. "How was I supposed to know she couldn't swim?"

"_She couldn't swim!_"

"I pulled her out the second I realised she wasn't faking."

Satsuki gave him the look, the look he knew well, the kind of look that said 'why am I friends with such a crayfish loving, boobs obsessed, basketball idiot, who has no appreciation for the delicate feelings of women'. Though he couldn't imagine words like 'delicate' or 'feelings' being applied to Tsukino, who had still managed to swear bloody vengeance on him amidst a violent coughing fit while he sprinted away, crayfish basket in hand so that he could set them free in a safe place, away from curly haired psychopaths.

"I saved her, didn't?"

Momoi scowled.

"Aomine-kun really has no appreciation for the delicate feelings of women. Sometimes I don't know why I put up with you. Crayfish loving, boobs obsessed, basketball idiot."

Aomine stared at her and then in a grave voice said, "Satsuki, I think I'm a mind-reader."

She went to smack his arm but he ran behind Kuroko, holding the shorter boy in front of him like an inept shield. This was where Murasakibara would have come in handy, although knowing him, he probably would have just grabbed Aomine by the collar and offered him up to _Sachin_ in exchange for the chocolate bars he knew she kept in her bag for just such an occasion.

"Please calm down, Momoi-san," said Kuroko. "From what Kame-san told me, Aomine-kun acted reasonably."

"Kuroko-kun, not you too. Defending this _idiot,_" said Momoi, trying to swing her bag at Aomine. Kuroko moved out of the way and it connected with Aomine's head, knocking him off balance.

"_Satsuki!_"

"Serves you right," said Momoi, hands on hips as Aomine knelt at her feet, gripping his sore head. "Instead of hiding from this girl, maybe you should apologise to her. A sincere apology from the heart goes a long way, you know."

"Fine," muttered Aomine, standing up. "I'll apologise to her when I see her in class. Happy?"

"Hmph."

At the end of try-outs, Momoi went over to the assistant coach leaving Kuroko and Aomine alone to head to their respective classes.

"I didn't want to say anything in front of Momoi-san," said Kuroko, as they walked through the hallway, "but a little drowning probably did Kame-san some good."

Aomine grinned. "Remind me never to get on your bad side, Tetsu."

"Saying that," said Kuroko. "It was nice knowing you, Aomine-kun."

* * *

Balancing her fancy new pencil on the tip of her nose like a trained seal, Tsukino paid little attention as the teacher went around the room asking everyone to stand up and say what they had done during their spring break, safe in the knowledge that Midorima's broad back would hide her antics from discovery.

"Uhhh... for my spring break I guess I spent most of my time playing basketball..." said a gravelly voice two rows across. Eyes moving slyly to the side, still balancing the pencil, she watched as Aomine stood and regaled the class with his holiday activities. "... and then I spent a week with the basketball team at a mountain resort training, and when I came back-" Here, Aomine made eye contact with Tsukino, gulping. "-I also went fishing by the canal."

"I hope there was some studying, also, Aomine-kun, amongst all the basketball," said Hasegawa-senpai, eyes narrowing suggestively behind his spectacles.

"Sure."

"You may sit down."

When it was Midorima's turn, he stood up quickly, knocking his chair back into her desk and causing the pencil to fall off her nose. Glaring angrily at the back of his head, Tsukino grabbed the pencil and stabbed him in the butt with the pointy end while he was speaking. To his credit, he barely tensed up, perhaps used to it by now.

"You did that on purpose," she hissed in his ear when he sat back down.

"I assure you I have no idea what you're babbling about," said Midorima, still facing front.

"Tsukino-kun," said Hasegawa-sensei. "Could you please stand up and inform the class about what you did over spring break?"

Their stocky slave driver of a teacher, Hasegawa-sensei, had hit seventy last year and celebrated by falling down a flight of steps and breaking his hip. Of course, the school tried to convince, or rather force the stubborn powerhouse to take the year off for recovery and while he was at it, maybe take a look at some of these retirement packages we have here for you, colour coded and ranked in order of price, but Hasegawa wouldn't hear of it. Apparently determined to take one more member of the Tsukino family all the way through to graduation, having taught both her father and her eldest brother, he had managed to go through his physical therapy in half the time and get back for her enrolment.

Tsukino had yet to figure out if this was a good thing.

Prodding Midorima one last time for good measure, she rose from her chair.

"During my spring, I visited my grandparents in Akita," she said, about to sit back down again when Hasegawa-sensei raised his hand.

"And what did you do in Akita?"

Unlike the other teachers, Hasegawa-sensei, undeterred by her spotty record, always insisted on her full participation, which meant he would keep dragging her into the spotlight against her will.

"Hung out," Tsukino said dully, and tried to sit down again.

"Doing what?"

"Stuff."

"What stuff?"

"You know, _stuff_."

"Elaborate on _stuff_, please."

Frustrated, Tsukino blurted out the first thing that came to mind. "We baked cupcakes!"

There was silence.

From the corner of her eye, she saw Aomine bury his face into his arms, his shoulders shaking, and she twitched, lowering herself slowly into her seat. Good thing she didn't mention the crocheting.

"Thank you, Tsukino-san. Perhaps you might think about providing cakes for the school's annual bake sale," said Hasegawa.

Unlikely, Tsukino inwardly scoffed, grabbing her pencil and stabbing Midorima in the shoulder, just in case he was thinking of deriving any amusement from the revelation.

There was a sound of a chair scraping back behind her and Tsukino cocked her head round to see the girl from the Swim Club standing behind her desk.

"Good Day. My name is Sakata Riyeko."

"Ah, Sakata-kun, these aren't introductions," said Hasegawa-sensei.

"I'm just being thorough. Tsukino-san was not aware of my existence up until this morning."

Tsukino grinned up at her new best friend. "Sakata Riyeko, right."

"That means nothing. I just said my name."

"If you hadn't said it, I would have remembered."

"Perhaps I should write my name on my forehead in permanent ink."

"That's not a bad idea."

Hasegawa-sensei interrupted before the discussion could get into full swing. "Your spring, Sakata-kun, please."

The next whole minute, down to the second, was spent listening to a detailed account of Sakata's spring activities. Apparently, she visited the states with her family where she rode horses, took a tour of Universal Studios and had a brief, possibly romantic encounter with a weird Japanese boy who on their first meeting stuffed his face full of cheeseburgers to avoid having to speak.

"Sounds like true love," said Tsukino, eyes wide.

"Please don't be jealous, Tsukino-san," said Sakata. "As I have said before, while I am flattered by your interest in me, I cannot return your feelings. Perhaps if you had a sex change, I might consider it."

"It's decided. I'll start saving up right away."

"You may sit down, Sakata-kun," said Hasegawa-sensei, pinching the bridge of his nose.

"Thank you," said Sakata, bowing and taking her seat. There she took a piece of paper, wrote down her name in thick black ink and folded it into a stand at the top of her desk. "For your benefit, Tsukino-san."

When the last of the students finished talking about their breaks, Hasegawa opened up the class representative elections. Of course, Tsukino never put her name forward for these things, begrudging school spirit like the aunty who smells like cheap wine and kisses you on the mouth with her bright red lipstick. However, she was surprised that her new best friend didn't nominate herself, having pegged her as the type. All Sakata-san needed was a pair of glasses and a tsundere complex.

Tsukino looked at Midorima, the cogs in her head turning, before poking him with her favourite pencil.

"What?"

She decided to test her theory. "You should run for class representative."

"Do not make suggestions like we're friends, Tsukino," Midorima said without turning round.

"I guess it's better if someone weak-minded and easy to push around becomes class rep," said Tsukino, eyes glinting madly as she stared at Midorima's back. "That way I can do what I want for a whole other year." She punctuated the point by stabbing him with her pencil.

A moment later, he had stood up and nominated himself for the position.

"I did it because you can't be allowed to roam free," Midorima told her. "The class requires a firm hand and if that is what is required of me, so be it."

"_Tsundere_."

"What did you say?"

"You heard what I said you tsundere."

When the bell rang for lunch, Midorima went to the front of the class with his fellow female representative perhaps to discuss disciplinary methods for the wayward and unruly, while Sakata Riyeko excused herself to go run an errand, leaving Tsukino alone in the middle of the classroom, attempting to re-balance the pencil.

Normally Tsukino would take lunch in the cafeteria with Kuroko, but she was still annoyed with him for dragging her all the way to the quad only to ditch her. When she saw him next, she intended to parade her new best friend (Tsukino glanced at the piece of paper) Sakata Riyeko around like a prize-winning Shi Tzu and inform him that he had been demoted to the classless rank of a bad acquaintance that stuck. As she contemplated this rather childish and likely ineffective form of revenge, someone pulled up a seat next to her desk and whipped the pencil off her nose.

She glared at Aomine.

"Peace offering?" said Aomine, laying his bento on her desk.

Tsukino eyed the bento hungrily. That is until he lifted the lid off. They stared at it in stunned silence.

"A friend made it," he said darkly, replacing the lid, not to open it again until it was held upside down over the garbage disposal at home.

"First you drown me, now you're trying to poison me," said Tsukino. "I'm starting to think you don't like me, Aomine-kun."

"Yeah, about the canal," said Aomine, reminding himself of the sincere apology he was meant to be giving, otherwise Satsuki might hunt him down and beat him with his own shoe. "I'm sorry, okay. It was an accident. I _sincerely_ apologise."

"You took your sweet time rescuing me. Did you have a moment of moral crisis?" asked Tsukino, eyes narrowing suspiciously as she leaned forward and invaded his personal space. "If I let her die… who would even know? That sort of thing."

"I thought you were faking."

"Why would anyone fake something like that?"

Aomine gave her a look. "You faked a heart attack to get out of gym last year."

"It was either that or cramps."

"What thirteen year old doesn't know how to swim, anyway?"

"The kind whose father died in a horrific boating accident you insensitive bastard," Tsukino cried out, burying her face in her hands.

Aomine's mouth fell open in shock, then he remembered that he had met Tsukino's father last year when he had come to see the principal for a disciplinary action meeting.

"Just accept the apology, idiot!" he yelled, drawing awkward stares from his classmates.

"I'll accept your apology if you bring me the head of one of your pet crayfish," said Tsukino, grinning at him. "Oooooh, or maybe a necklace made of cicadas. I'll also accept a pair of your Jordans. Full disclosure; I plan on burning them in front of you."

Getting up from his seat, resisting the urge to kick his chair back like a petulant child, Aomine snatched his bag up and stalked out of the classroom. Screw apologising. Satsuki had no idea what she was talking about and if she asked, Aomine would just lie and pray that all that crap she spouted about women's intuition was a load of rubbish.

Going over to his locker so that he could dump the bento before heading to the cafeteria, he entered the combination into his padlock and unhooked it. Distracted after his encounter with Tsukino, he didn't hear the buzzing until it was too late.

* * *

"I said _a_ bee," said Tsukino, unable to tear her eyes away. "Put _a_ bee in his locker. As in singular."

From behind the protective shielding of the window, Tsukino stared wide-eyed at the pandemonium currently unfurling in the hallway outside of Aomine's locker. Students screamed as they scrambled frantically to find an exit, some escaping into classrooms, other, less unfortunate beings, curling into balls to expose as little skin as possible.

Next to her, Sakata Riyeko crossed her arms over her chest. "Yes. That does make more sense."

After much searching, Tsukino discovered Aomine cowering in a maintenance closet, arms wrapped around his head as he muttered prayers to himself in the darkness. When she opened the door, he let out a small yelp, flying backwards into the shelves.

"Did you think bees could open doors, now?" asked Tsukino. "This isn't a cartoon, moron."

But the insult fell flat. Despite her prank's unexpectedly epic success, seeing Aomine in this state was not as satisfying as she thought it would be. Perhaps because she knew it was one of those 'too far' moments. Kuroko had warned her about her 'too far' moments, and how their excess robbed her of any sense of accomplishment. Also how they would inevitably land her in jail one day.

"Are they gone?" Aomine asked, starting to gain a semblance of composure as he took his hands away from his head and peered behind her into the empty hallway.

"Yeah. Did you know we had a beekeeping society?" said Tsukino, holding out her hand to help him up. But he just stared at it, perhaps still traumatised. "They rolled up to the scene like ghostbusters in those weird outfits of theirs. Surprisingly very cool. Uh... it should be safe now."

There was a awkward silence.

"Hey, Tsukino, tell me something," said Aomine, voice chillingly low. "Were you responsible for the beehive in my locker?"

Her hand curled back and she dropped it to her side. "If I say yes, are you going to beat the crap out of me?"

"Ahh, that depends," said Aomine, standing unaided and cracking his neck. The scared Aomine that she had walked in on only moments ago seemed never to have existed, now in his place stood a monster whose aura was dyed black with the threat of things to come. Tsukino edged backwards. "How fast can you run?"

For a tortoise, surprisingly fast.

* * *

**Author's Note:**

So I wrote this fic a long, long time ago, maybe over a year ago, but it just ended up kicking around my laptop this whole time. Recently, I got back into KNB and I looked back at it and realised it had a bit of potential so I reworked it, properly developing Tsukino's character. I think at the beginning, I was just writing it for fun because I was in love with Aomine, but now with distance there might actually be a plot here and proper character development!

The amount of brothers Tsukino has is based on Murasakibara actually, since I read he has four siblings and I thought, _damn _that's enough for a basketball team. For me I based her name on the whole phonetics thing of Tuxedo Kamen/Tsukino Usagi, being a massive fan of Sailor Moon, but it managed to spout out this bizarre backstory. The captain of the boy's basketball team at the moment is still Nijimura, as he has yet to pass on the baton. Err... what else, Midorima is my favourite character and I am very, very happy that he's in the same class as Aomine.

The fic will eventually reach high school and angsty Aomine, but hopefully keep with the tone of humour throughout, although I can't deny there will be occasional moments of '**REAL LIFE**' slipping in. The major reason for starting this fic up again was humour, it's one of the hardest genres and I wanted to get all the practise and feedback on it as I could. There's quite a bit of exposition at the beginning of the chapter, talking about her family, and I'm not a hundred percent sure on it working, although they are integral in their own way.

Also, does anyone know more about Aomine's crayfish thing? I think I read somewhere that he used to think they grew up to be lobsters, but I don't know if that was from something canon or a fanfiction. I really hope its true because that's amazing.

Again thanks for reading and I hope you enjoyed this chapter! I am available by PM if anyone wants to discuss anything and look forward to feedback :) Updates may be slow because I am generally quite rubbish, so apologies in advance for that.


	3. Teiko's Terrorist

_A/N: Updates and replies to reviews have been delayed due to a sensitive family matter. Thanks to all the readers out there for your support and for your understanding. This chapter is a filler I wrote a long time ago so please enjoy._

**You Were Conceived Next to a Tortoise Enclosure**

**Teiko's Terrorist**

Teiko Middle School had a basement. Inside that basement, above a pipe, on a small stretch of wall, there was a noticeboard. Arranged in the shape of a pyramid, several headshots of individual students had been affixed to it with thumbtacks. In the uppermost row, there were three pictures; two boys and a sharp-eyed girl. The girl's picture was the only one to have been desecrated so appallingly. Her eyes and teeth had been inked in, devil horns added to the top of her curly hair and a Hitler moustache scribbled above her upper lip.

A dart zipped through the air and stuck in the centre of her forehead.

The picture was of Tsukino Kame.

* * *

There were a few things Tsukino Kame deemed crucial to her existence. Getting a minimum twelve hours of beauty sleep (she had read somewhere that sleep promoted growth, thus justifying her many naps), drinking lots of milk (ditto), her collection of DVDs starring Takeshi Kaneshiro (because… reasons), and finally her pride as a delinquent. Anything that threatened these things was immediately deemed a hazard in need of immediate removal.

"I insist that you try on the swimsuit that I bought for you yesterday. With my own money."

Unfortunately, the current threat to her pride had somehow managed to endear itself to her. Even with her eyes shut, Tsukino could feel the gazes of bewildered onlookers as Sakata Riyeko dangled the bright purple, frilly one-piece above her head.

"It was the only one I could find on such late notice in your size," said Sakata. "It also worth noting that the store has a limited seven-day return policy on children's swimwear."

Tsukino, who was laying on her back in the grass, warily cracked an eye open. "I told you already, I can't swim."

"You can learn to swim," said Sakata. "If you commence your lessons today after school, I believe you will be ready to join the team in a month, perhaps less."

"This isn't the plot of some feel-good sports manga, Sakata-san."

"Perhaps, but you are a natural, Tsukino-san, and I am confident that you will pick it up quickly."

"Is this the part where you say I have the body of a dolphin, and the nose to match?" Tsukino asked, yawning as she sat up.

A group of girls from their class sitting in a ring nearby snapped their heads to their lunches when Tsukino turned to grin at them.

"In terms of facial features, I would have likened you more to a shark."

"I'll take that as a compliment."

"It was not intended as such."

"Anyway," said Tsukino, rolling her shoulder to loosen it up, "I have a thing tonight."

"With Mareo?"

"Yep."

_"Heads up!"_

Tsukino's hand shot out, catching the ball just before it connected with Sakata's head. Tossing it over her shoulder without sparing a glance, Tsukino inadvertently hit one of the students who had been playing catch in the head, thus solidifying her reputation as a scumbag once more. Had she turned around, she might have seen the boy with spiky brown hair observing the events intently through the lens of his camera. But that was a story for another time.

"Your reflexes are quite impressive," Sakata said as she folded the purple swimsuit and placed it carefully inside Tsukino's bag for her to try on at a later time. "But they won't be worth a damn if someone pushes you into a canal again. And considering your personality, I'm guessing that the chances of that are quite high."

Tsukino was about to come up with a scathing retort that would put her new best friend in a state of shock and awe or failing that make an obscene gesture, when a large shadow fell over them.

"Speak of the devil," said Sakata.

The blood drained from Tsukino's face.

For as long as Tsukino could remember she had been terrorised by her older brothers Ichiro and Zinan. While she may have gotten the occasional stink bomb in, much of ages zero to eleven had been spent fighting a one-sided guerrilla war that usually ended with her being farted on. The harsh conditioning of being forced to sprint through the local woods and climb trees to avoid capture had made her extremely swift, agile, and able to react quickly to her surroundings until eventually even Teiko's Tsukino Brothers couldn't keep up with her.

All this meant absolutely nothing in the face of Aomine Daiki, who was apparently the fastest human being on the planet and extremely unforgiving when it came to bees, no matter how much she begged and whimpered.

"Yo, Tsukino."

Snatching her bag, Tsukino hugged it over the top of her head and scooted behind Sakata. She didn't think her hair, industrious though it was, could survive another one of Aomine's Special Noogie Attacks.

"Relax," said Aomine, eyeing her tiredly. "I'm not gonna hit you."

"That's exactly what you said right before you tricked me into coming out of the girls' toilets."

Sakata turned around and stared at Tsukino, who shrunk further under her scrutinising gaze.

"He said he had ice cream."

"Why do I get the impression that you would sell your first-born for a tub of ice cream?" asked Sakata.

"Because I would rent out my womb on a yearly basis for a steady supply of Rocky Road."

"Perhaps if we found a compatible male specimen we could use you to breed the perfect swimmer. Aomine-Kun, would you be interested-"

"I refuse."

"That's understandable. As a woman Tsukino-san does leave something to be desired."

Tilting his head to the side, Aomine considered this seriously. "No boobs."

"Narrow hips."

"Too short."

"Big teeth."

"You wanna die you bastards?"

Aomine stepped forwards suddenly and Tsukino lurched behind Sakata. Her pride as a delinquent had been dragged through the dirt and now the bastard toying with her.

"Go away, Aomine!" shouted Tsukino. "Haven't you done enough, you monster!"

"Ah shut up, I need a favour," he said, lightly kicking her shin. "I can't find Tetsu. Gimme his phone number."

"Tetsuya doesn't want you calling him. Because he doesn't like you. Because you suck and he loves me more."

Biting into her apple, Sakata observed the scene with mild interest. Having never met the oft spoke of and highly lauded Kuroko Tetsuya, it was like watching two people casually discussing dinner plans with the Loch Ness Monster.

Frowning, Aomine kicked Tsukino harder. "Don't be a pain."

"Fine. I'll call him for you," said Tsukino. She maintained eye contact with him as she slowly took her phone out of her backpack, shielding the screen from his view. "Voicemail. He's probably in the library. That's the only time he turns his phone off."

Well there was that one other time when Tsukino forgot to knock, but out of respect for Kuroko's modesty and the safety of her collection of Takeshi Kaneshiro DVDs, Tsukino opted not to mention what that was.

"I recommend you go there right now, post-haste," said Tsukino, flaring her eyes suggestively. "You're not wanted here. Go, go, go."

"There's no way I'm gonna find that invisible guy with all those people around," Aomine muttered to himself. His eyes narrowed calculatingly as he regarded her crouched figure. "But you can find him."

Tsukino's leg muscles tightened as she glared at him. "You can't make me."

At which point Aomine chased her through the sports field, put her in a headlock, and dragged her away.

* * *

The library was to Aomine Daiki and Tsukino Kame a mysterious, faraway place, like the Emerald City. In that they had never been there, were relying entirely upon the vague signposts set up in the hallways to guide them, and since they both had the directional acuity of rocking horse, encountered much hijinks on their journey.

A girl who had long ago fallen in love with Aomine's dorky smile and untethered energy in elementary school walked the halls with the express intention of giving him the love letter she had been crafting for four years. She found him unashamedly interlocked with another girl. His arm wound lovingly round her neck. From her vantage point behind a crowd of people, she could not make out what the girl looked like, only that Aomine was hugging her close to him and whispering sweet nothings in her ear.

"Stop struggling," said Aomine.

"Don't you think you sound a bit too much like a serial killer?" Tsukino shot back.

Tearing the love letter to shreds in her hand, tears streaming down her cheeks, the girl retreated into the shadows never to appear in this story again.

Leaning away from him, Tsukino tried not to gag. "Your breath reeks. What have you been eating?"

Aomine breathed into his palm, sniffed it and grimaced. "Mum bought home Nattō."

"Are you sure it wasn't a pile of shit? Because your mouth smells like a pile of shit."

Holding her firmly in place, Aomine exhaled a steady stream of repugnant air into her face until she managed to free one of her hands and shove a stick of gum into his mouth. Thanking her, he resumed dragging her down the hallway, popping bubbles as he went.

One group of extremely short first years, some of whom barely reached Aomine's waist shuffled into their path.

"Aomine-senpai!" cried one of the small boys. "Are you okay? Did Tsukino-senpai hurt you?"

From her bent position, she glared at the munchkin leader.

"You can't be serious," she said. "He has me in a headlock."

"Because if Tsukino-san is bothering you, just say the word," said the munchkin leader, his fat rosy cheeks twitching animatedly. "You don't have to be afraid of her."

"Ah yeah, I'm fine," said Aomine, scratching his forehead.

"I am the victim here!" shouted Tsukino. "Aomine is like three times bigger than me."

"D-don't try to fool us," squeaked a girl with blonde pigtails and big blue eyes. Tsukino named her Goldie McRiding Hood. There was a lot of overlap between Tsukino's fairy-tale mythos, mostly because she lost interest the moment it became clear there would be little bloodshed.

"We know you were behind the destruction of our model city of Tokyo last year," said Goldie McRiding Hood.

"That was Godzilla," said Tsukino, trying to suppress the grin on her face. It wasn't a lie. The toy Godzilla she had brought from home had indeed been the culprit, as could be seen on her online vlog.

"None of us want any trouble. Puh-puh-please, leave Aomine-senpai alone," said Goldie McRiding Hood. The others muttered their agreement, staring imploringly at Tsukino. "Haven't you terrorised the people of this school long enough, Tsukino-senpai?"

"This is unbelievable," said Tsukino, twisting her head to look at Aomine. He merely shrugged in return. "I didn't do anything… today."

"Today," said Aomine.

"Don't worry, Aomine-senpai," exclaimed the munchkin leader, puffing up his chest. "We'll call a teacher right away."

"Uh, that's okay," said Aomine, but the army of munchkins had already marched past him and were well on their way to justice.

"What the hell?" said Tsukino.

"You heard of the boy who cried wolf?" said Aomine.

"Is that the one where the boy has a torrid love affair with the wolf and then the wolf leaves him for his grandmother and he cries for forty days and forty nights and floods the world?"

"Hey… you have shit for brains don't you?"

"At least I don't have shit for breath."

Soon the reluctant pair reached a dim and gloomy crossroads (the fluorescent tubing had been smashed the day before when Tsukino tried to demonstrate to a disbelieving Sakata that she could indeed reach the ceiling). According to the skewed sign overhead, the library was simultaneously to their left and straight ahead. As they bickered over the correct way -Tsukino mostly swearing at him for the sake of swearing at him, while Aomine half strangled her to death- Midorima appeared on the straight road. Seeing them, he tried to make himself very inconspicuous so that he could sneak away before they-

"Yo, Midorima, wait up!" Aomine shouted, running up to him, Tsukino under his arm. "Tell us where the library is."

Midorima deflated for a moment, then readjusted his glasses and squared his shoulders imperiously. "Lower the volume of your voice, Aomine. Have respect for the students who are actually here to learn."

"Yeah, Aomine."

"That goes for you too Tsukino. I could hear your foul language all the way on the other side of the school."

Shooting him an evil grin, Tsukino proceeded to inform him of his mother's less than respectable reputation, her issues with weight gain comparative to the size of the planet, the ambiguity of his paternity and how his first date would conclude with tears of laughter after they saw the disproportionate size of his genitalia.

Needless to say, Midorima did not help them find the library.

"Can't keep your mouth shut for five minutes," said Aomine, groaning as he watched Midorima's trembling back disappear from view.

"I don't want to hear that from you, dog-breath."

"Yeah, well at this rate we're never gonna find Tetsu," said Aomine, giving her neck a squeeze.

"Why do you want to find him anyway?" asked Tsukino.

"I need to give him his book," said Aomine. "He lent it to me for English class."

"I didn't know you could read."

"There's a lot of stuff you don't know about me."

"I know that you hide your perverted magazines in your textbooks in class so the teacher doesn't catch you."

"Eh, I don't really hide that though-"

"I know you pick your nose sometimes when you think people aren't looking."

"Oi-"

"I know you sulked for a week when you found out Horikita Mai got a boyfriend."

"How the hell-?"

"I know everything about you, Aomine-sama," said Tsukino, her eyes wide and terrifying. "After all I am in love with you- OW!"

"What was that, your fifth confession to me?" asked Aomine, his tone bored, a clump of her hair twisted in his hands. "Come up with some new material."

Aomine's body suddenly went stiff and he released Tsukino. Straightening up and rubbing her sore neck, Tsukino gazed at the sight that had given him pause. Her shoulders slumped.

"What did you do to piss them off this time?" Aomine asked dryly, referring to the angry mob advancing on them from all sides.

"Why do you automatically assume I did something?" said Tsukino, searching in vain for an exit. They were boxed in. "They've called you out before too."

"Tsukino_." _

"Okay, okay. Last night I may or may not have stolen all of the president's clothes while he was in the shower and replaced them with a girl's gym uniform."

Aomine's scowl deepened.

"I _also_ may or may not have put bleach in his shampoo, itching powder in his shower gel and shut down all the water in the middle of said shower…"

"Is that girl's face green?"

"And this morning I may or may not have thrown water balloons at them. Filled with paint."

The advancing army halted. Altogether, there were about twenty of them, a group made up of hall monitors, class representatives and students who viewed untucked shirts as the eighth deadliest sin, expressions set in grim determination, badges pinned proudly to their lapels.

"They look ready to kill you."

"It's not my fault," said Tsukino, jutting her chin out defiantly. "What moron takes a shower after playing darts? I sweat more on the toilet."

"What about the committee members?"

"I needed to test out my new sling shot," said Tsukino, pulling it from inside her cardigan. "Mareo got it for me."

"Put that away, dumbass!"

One of the rows parted and a boy walked forward. A red rash had spread over the side of his face courtesy of the itching powder, and a fringe of piebald black and blonde hair obscured his eyes, half-wild with desperation. In his left hand, three darts were sticking out between his trembling knuckles as he glared at Tsukino.

"Tsukino Kame, class 2-D," said the president, his voice booming with authority. "Discounting your abysmal attendance and ill-fitting uniform, since the commencement of this school year you have been found guilty of five counts of vandalism, six counts of property destruction, eight counts of assault, twenty-two counts of slander, and just now you were accused of destroying the model city of Tokyo by the Model Architects' Society."

Aomine let out a low whistle. "You did all that in a week?"

"I would have done more but Tetsuya confiscated my fireworks."

"Ah."

"Tsukino Kame," said the president, a demented smile cracking his face, "as the most prolific delinquent in the history of Teiko I am glad to say that this is the end of the road for you. Prepare to be disciplined. We will now escort you to the vice-principal's office, and we will be recommending another disciplinary meeting with your parents to curtail your disruptive antics."

"The most prolific delinquent in the history of Teiko, eh?" said Tsukino, raising an eyebrow as she considered this. "I'm honoured. Am I getting a medal, President-san?"

There was a thoughtful pause.

"…You forgot my name again, didn't you?" said the president.

There was another thoughtful pause.

"Of course not, you're Akashi Seijuro."

Aomine hung his head as the president's face went through seven shades of red before finally resting on purple.

"That's the president of the student council, you idiot!" shouted the president of the disciplinary committee, shaking his fist full of darts at her. "At least have the decency to remember my name after humiliating me. It's J-"

"Oh, I remember now," said Tsukino. The president's face lit up. Then she turned to Aomine. "Isn't Akashi Seijuro the guy you and Tetsuya are always going on about?"

"Yeah, he's the vice-captain of the basketball team."

"So what's this guy's name?"

"Beats me."

"Don't ignore me!" shrieked the president, stomping over to them. "My name is J-"

"Quick, Aomine, breathe on him with your dog breath."

"What the hell?"

"It's a diversion tactic. Just do it."

"Screw this. Oi, president-san, catch," Aomine said, snatching Tsukino's slingshot from her and tossing it to the president.

Taking advantage of the president's confusion, Aomine grabbed Tsukino's hand, and sprinted at the crowd. Immediately, the noble warriors of the disciplinary committee flung themselves against the walls, as Aomine was very large and scary and they had recently witnessed him giving Tsukino Kame a noogie.

Glancing back, Tsukino laughingly waved back at Kuroko, who had been walking behind them ever since the munchkin troop left. Shaking his head, Kuroko resolved to keep his phone turned off for the rest of the day and perhaps learn how to block Tsukino's number. Something bad was coming; he could feel it.

As Tsukino and Aomine dashed around a corner, three darts zoomed over their heads and stuck in a poster advertising the Model City Club.

* * *

Aomine skidded round the corner of the building and pinned Tsukino against the wall under the fire escape as a group of students from the disciplinary committee ran by. They had been running non-stop for the last twenty minutes, despite Tsukino's suggestion to take a stand on the roof and make use up the rest of her paint balloons. Aomine figured the disciplinary committee would postpone their search when the lunch bell sounded so they just needed to hold out till then. He didn't want to end up getting kicked off the team over something as petty as being embroiled in one of Tsukino's prank wars.

Unlike Tsukino, whose file was two drawers thick Aomine was a relatively average student. With the help of Momoi's last minute notes, he got passing grades, albeit barely. He had good attendance, participated in school festivals if asked to, and of course, he was the ace of Teiko's prestigious basketball team. The one and only time the Disciplinary Committee had called him out of class was in first year just after Horikita Mai got a boyfriend and he had been skiving off to go mope on the roof. He remembered that Tsukino of all people had arrived ahead of time to warn him.

Now here he was, hiding with her, helping her even since his reflexes were much better. It would have made sense for him to leave, but it never occurred to him that that was an option and neither of them thought to question it.

"The girl with the short hair," said Tsukino, sniggering into her hand as they snuck glances round the corner, "I cut her ponytail off in first year."

"Let me guess, she deserved it," said Aomine, eyes darting side to side.

"She made fun of my uniform."

Scanning Tsukino from head to toe, he had to admit he couldn't blame her. Tsukino's tattered cardigan and shirt were way too long, drowning her torso and almost obscuring the existence of her skirt, which looked like it had been patched up so many times none of the original material could have possibly remained.

"You do look kinda homeless," said Aomine.

She punched him half-heartedly, her fist resting against his chest. "Hey, be nice. I'm sensitive about that."

"Heh, why? You're not sensitive about anything else," said Aomine.

Something passed through her face briefly and Aomine bristled. He wasn't observant like Kuroko or analytical like Momoi, but he did have one thing on his side, and that was his instincts. Something was off with Tsukino; it had been since the beginning of the year. It probably had something to do with that Mareo character she was always going on about.

"How can you speak so coldly to a delicate young maiden such as myself?" said Tsukino.

Or maybe she was just Tsukino.

"Delicate my ass."

"This is why Horikita Mai will never love you."

Tsukino's screams echoed into the warm spring air as Aomine subjected her to a gruelling minute of his Special Noogie Attack. They were soon found by the disciplinary committee.


	4. The Unholy Stall

_A/N: Thank you for your reviews, favourites and alerts. I'm using my chapter buffer to update for the moment, so replies to reviews will still be delayed. Thanks again for your patience. You're all awesome._

**You Were Conceived Next to a Tortoise Enclosure**

**The Unholy Stall**

The sticky spring weather was beginning to get to people in the wrong way, turn their brains to short-tempered mush, make them act rashly without a thought to the consequences, blah blah blah… That was the excuse Tsukino Kame planned to give the vice-principal when she was asked about the students from the disciplinary committee in the Nurse's office.

"Two weeks into the school year and you're already causing trouble," said Papa Tsukino, pacing back and forth in the waiting room. With every step, he seemed to shake the foundations of the building, his large shadow flitting across the faces of his wife and daughter. "My daughter's going to be the first student in the history of Teiko to be suspended. **(1)** I won't be able to show my face in public. Seppuku? Maybe I can commit seppuku."

"Papa is over-exaggerating because Papa's having a hard time channelling his anger," said Mama Tsukino, smiling as she tucked a strand of her daughter's hair behind her ear. Tsukino merely scowled into the distance. "Although, if they do suspend you, you can help me look after your baby brother while you're off school."

Tsukino's mouth fell open in horror.

"If she gets suspended, I'm abandoning her at a convent."

Tsukino let out a sigh of relief.

The office door opened and one of the students from the disciplinary committee exited. Greeted by Kame's creepy grin, which was filled with promises of their next meeting, the girl tried to withdraw but a hand fell on her shoulder and thrust her forward. The vice-principal waved her off with a pursed smile.

Papa Tsukino swung round and glared at his daughter. "Stop. Grinning."

Tsukino stopped.

"Gekkou-san, Beniko-san," said vice-principal Yamamoto, shaking her parents' hands. "It's a pleasure to see you both again. I trust the boys are doing well?"

Kame made a face like she had bitten into a lemon as Mama Tsukino beamed at the vice-principal. "They are. Thank you. You're so kind to enquire after them."

"We do miss them here at Teiko," said Yamamoto-sensei, her gaze falling on Tsukino a millisecond longer than necessary. "They were a great asset to the school."

Tsukino wondered if she would still say that if she knew what Zinan used to get up to in the toilets after practise.

"You'll wait here a moment, Kame," said Vice-principal Yamamoto. "I'd like to have a word with your parents first."

Tsukino slumped into the chair.

Alone now except for Hashimoto-baa, the seventy-two year old receptionist, Tsukino was tempted to skip out on the disciplinary meeting and face the wrath of her parents when she got home, or at least her father's wrath. Her mother, the resident hippie, incense sticks and aromatherapy abound, was almost impossible to piss off. If it weren't for the fact that she always smelled like freshly baked cookies and breast milk, Tsukino would have joined their neighbours in thinking she was a pothead.

Just as she was contemplating whether or not Kuroko would let her hide out in his house until everything blew over, Zinan, the second oldest and least favourite of her brothers, walked into the waiting room. She slumped further into the chair and tried to make herself as small as possible, which wasn't much of a stretch.

"Oh hoh hoh! Midget Middle Child," exclaimed Zinan, going over to her, a swagger in his step. Zinan boasted a height of one hundred and ninety centimetres. Literally. He never shut up about it. "What's this, the third time they've been called in?"

Fourth, but who was counting.

"What are you doing here?" said Tsukino, glaring sourly at him. "Shouldn't you be at your own school, far, far away from here?"

"Kuroko called me and told me what happened," said Zinan. Tsukino made a mental note to beat the traitor later. "What did they do to piss off The Almighty Midget Middle Child this time?"

"They called me The Almighty Midget Middle Child."

Zinan threw his head back and laughed that infuriating glittery laugh of his.

"Why are you here?" asked Tsukino, feeling the vein pulse in her forehead.

"Well, Kuroko suggested I use my charm on the vice-principal to stop you from getting suspended. I'm missing practise for this so you better show some gratitude. Takeuchi's a stickler for rules."

"You have about as much charm as a donkey fart," she said, crossing her arms over her chest. "Go away, I don't need your help."

"Ah perhaps not my help, but you might need his," said Zinan, cocking his head back. "Oi, Buro, stop dragging your feet."

With an almost imperceptible tread, Saburo, Tsukino's favourite brother, if only because she could bully him into doing her bidding, appeared in the waiting room, his droopy eyes averted nervously to the ground.

"Hi, Kame-nee," said Saburo. "Zi-nii said that you were about to be suspended and that I could help you."

Standing at one hundred and fifty six centimetres, he was almost as tall as Teiko's Akashi Seijuro. He was also still two years away from joining Teiko himself. That was, Tsukino realised, unless he decided not to apply for some reason, like his sister being suddenly suspended.

"You're going to pimp out our innocent, baby brother," said Tsukino, eyes wide.

"Do you have a problem with that?" asked Zinan.

"Nope," said Tsukino, slumping even further into the chair.

* * *

"GREETINGS TETSUYA," Tsukino announced loudly into Kuroko's ear as he exited the changing rooms.

He wriggled his pinkie finger in his ear. "Maybe we should take you to see an Otolaryngologist."

"An Otalagoblawhat?"

"Ear doctor."

"I'm going to pretend I didn't _hear_ that. Haha."

Kuroko stared at her.

"Get it? Because _ear_ doctor."

The kind of judgemental silence only Kuroko could generate expanded between them.

"_Anyway_," said Tsukino. "At the suggestion of the Disciplinary Committee, they're making me speak to someone once a week. I am also required to have perfect attendance for the rest of the year. All because that bastard president still holds a grudge."

"You did leave dog pooh in his locker."

"Last year! And he deserved it," said Tsukino. "What happened to the honour code? Thou shalt not rat, or whatever. What kind of spineless creature willingly _forms_ a school disciplinary committee, I ask you, Tetsuya?"

"Mmm," said Kuroko, eyes darting absentmindedly to the court.

"Am I keeping you from fraternising with the cool first-stringers?" Tsukino said, reaching up and pinching Kuroko's cheeks. "You are obligated, Tetsuya, obligated until the day you die to listen to me complain."

"Please don't do that, Kame-san," said Kuroko, batting her hands away.

"Don't you want to know what my punishment is? Courtesy of Buro's soul?"

Kuroko blinked. He didn't like the smug look in her eyes. "What?"

Before she could answer, a wave of first-stringers started pouring out of the changing room sweeping Kuroko along with them.

As Tsukino watched him head towards his dream, she remembered all the gruelling practices and after-school training sessions that had culminated to this and felt something swell in her chest. Then she burped and the feeling was gone.

"Um, Tsukino-san?"

Tsukino turned around and found herself face to face with a girl holding a clipboard to her chest, smiling politely. Tsukino's posture automatically went limp upon seeing her.

"Hey, Momoi-san."

Though they had both heard of one and other through Kuroko and Aomine, their first official meeting hadn't occurred until a week ago when Momoi had dragged Aomine over by the scuff of his collar and forced him to apologise to Tsukino for nearly drowning her. It seemed Aomine had failed to mention to Momoi about the beehive incident, or the subsequent beating Tsukino had received as recompense. Of course, upon seeing the glare Aomine was sending her from behind his childhood friend's back, tacitly advising her to keep her damn mouth shut, Tsukino had swiftly accepted the apology and run far, far away.

"Welcome to the first-string gymnasium," Momoi said warmly. "I don't know if Aomine-kun told you, but I'm one of the managers for the basketball team. I'll be supervising you today."

Tsukino was only thankful that it was Momoi and not Nijimura. Two years was a long time, but he was the type to hold grudges through several reincarnations and judging by the way he was currently yelling at some grey haired kid on the other side of the court for speaking out of turn, his vengeance would be severe.

An incomprehensible whine fell from Tsukino's lips.

Momoi cocked her head to the side. "Eh?"

"I'm going to die," she mumbled pathetically.

"Uh… ahh," said Momoi, following Tsukino's line of sight.

Aomine and the other regulars were standing in a semi-circle around the captain watching as he punished Haizaki, so it was an understandable when she misunderstood the source of Tsukino's fear.

"Did Aomine-kun do something to you again?" demanded Momoi, flinging her clipboard down and rolling up her sleeves. "That pig-headed idiot doesn't ever learn."

Eyes wide, Tsukino moved in front of Momoi, holding her hands up to stop her from carrying out her murderous intent.

"Misunderstanding!" squeaked Tsukino. "Misunderstanding!"

"Tsukino-san, you don't have to be afraid -"

"Aomine is a kind and merciful being," Tsukino said robotically, repeating the litany Aomine had made her recite as he sat on her back, mushing her face into the grass while he unashamedly ate the sweets she had bought him as a peace offering. "To even know him is one of the greatest of honours."

Momoi's eyebrows shot up in disbelief.

"U-uh… isn't there some sweaty basketball player underwear I'm supposed to be cleaning the skid marks off right now, Momoi-san?" asked Tsukino.

This seemed to distract Momoi for the time being, perhaps glad to find a foothold in the bizarre conversation.

"Ah, you don't have to worry about that yet. Laundry isn't until after practice. And it's mostly towels and uniforms."

"Oh right," said Tsukino, not hearing the last part, her body radiating defeat. The relief of diverting Momoi had been replaced by the despair of her fate, "you have to wait _until_ they've gotten all their sweaty juices locked in, huh. Hey, Momoi-san?"

"Mm?"

"Do we get special clamp stick thingies?" asked Tsukino, extending her arm and making strange claw like gestures with her fingers. "So we don't have to touch the underwear?"

Momoi pressed her pen to her lips thoughtfully before scrawling down on the clipboard. "That would be a really good idea actually."

Tsukino's shoulders slumped. "So that's a no."

"Sorry. The assistant managers will be here soon though. We'll help with laundry, so you won't have to deal with it by yourself."

"So there are people out there who willingly volunteer to touch sweaty underwear?" Tsukino asked, raising an eyebrow.

Momoi led Tsukino into the locker room. "I guess you could say it's one of the duties in helping out the basketball club, and again it's mainly towels and-"

"You know they say that boys who can do their own laundry make good husbands," said Tsukino.

Upon entering, their noses were hit with the overpoweringly dense aroma of antiperspirant uncomfortably mixed with sweat. Both girls, having grown up around the various odours of the male species, and in Tsukino's case her own, didn't bat an eyelid.

"Does that mean Kuroko-kun can do his own laundry?" asked Momoi, smiling suggestively at Tsukino.

It took a moment for the comment to sink in.

"_TETSUYA!_" Tsukino bellowed. Somewhere on the court, a distracted Kuroko accidentally passed to the opposing team and received a death glare from a purple haired giant.

"Oh sorry, I just thought- Aomine-kun said that you two were always together."

"By that logic shouldn't you and Aomine be expecting your fifth child right about now?"

A mortified blush sprung to Momoi's cheeks. "It's not like that!"

Tsukino straightened up suddenly, lifting her hand up to convey that she needed a moment to mentally prepare. Momoi, who was utterly confused at this point obliged nevertheless. When Tsukino began speaking, it sounded like she was reciting a pre-prepared speech.

"Tetsuya and I met when we were three years old at Day Care. For a long time Tetsuya was in love with me, which is understandable because, well-" here she gestured to herself. Momoi bit her lip to restrain a smile and continued to nod along. "-Eventually his feelings for me became too much to bear and he confessed (it was very sweet, he bought me a lollypop). Long story short, I rejected him, he pulled my hair, I poked his eye. It was all very messy, but so ends the romantic tale of Tsukino Kame and Kuroko Tetsuya at the ripe age of three and a half."

"That's a cute story," Momoi said with a sigh, her thoughts turning dark as she remembered how she and Aomine first met.

"He likes to deny all knowledge of the incident. Sometimes he even tries to claim that it was I who confessed to him. Can you believe the nerve of that guy?"

"So do you play basketball too?" Momoi asked, deciding there was no right answer to that question.

Tsukino scratched the back of her head, eyes narrowing. "Well… I'm a little out of practice right now."

"Oshiro-san recently told me that the girls' basketball team would love to take on new members if you're interested."

Recalling the face of the captain of the girls' basketball team, Tsukino's expression darkened and she muttered several nasty slurs under her breath.

"Sorry?"

"I'll keep that in mind, thanks," said Tsukino, grinning at Momoi with all her teeth. It looked painful.

"Ah…well, here we are."

They had stopped outside the toilets. Tsukino peeked in and saw a bunch of cleaning supplies propped up near one of the urinals. A frighteningly blank expression on her face, she stretched her arm out and pointed inside.

"I have to clean the toilets?"

Momoi gave her a strained smile as if to say she had no choice in the matter. "Yamamoto-sensei's orders."

"That is where they pee and defecate!" Tsukino blurted out, all her cool flying out the window. "Zi-nii told me he took a girl in there once and they- they did _things_ in one of the stalls!"

Nodding sympathetically, Momoi placed a hand on Tsukino's shoulder and shoved her inside. "Good luck."

* * *

"It's funny. The managers have never been asked to clean the toilets before," Momoi said an hour later.

Tsukino was lying on her belly on one of the benches in a zombiefied state, groaning and uttering mystifying statements about crescent moon shaped urinal cakes.

"Detention, huh? American's come up with the weirdest punishments."

"I think I found the stall… _the unholy stall_."

"Makes you wonder why Yamamoto-sensei would suggest something like that."

"Yamamoto… she holds a grudge," muttered Tsukino, rolling her face to the side so that she could meet Momoi's pink eyes with her dead fish ones. Many held a grudge when it came to Tsukino, Momoi would soon learn.

"Eh? Why?"

Tsukino averted her eyes. "It _may_ have something to do with me smashing her car window during the opening ceremony."

"How-?"

"I threw a rock at it."

"Oh. On purpose?"

"I was aiming for Zi-nii. But I regret nothing."

"Well… Yamamoto-sensei can be pretty scary I guess."

"She always used to flirt with my brothers when they went here. And I once caught her checking out Tetsuya's butt."

"No way! Seriously?" exclaimed Momoi.

"Yep… total perv."

"You know, now that I think about it, she does come to practice a lot."

"She has a thing for the young ones."

Momoi giggled, mock realisation dawning on her features. "She and Akashi-kun are always off to the side talking."

"They're probably discussing their weekend love hotel reservations."

"Or exchanging love letters."

"Of course. They can't leave an electronic trail otherwise they'd be sure to be discovered."

"It's like Romeo and Juliet," said Momoi, with a swooning sigh.

"What version of Romeo and Juliet did you read?"

"Momoi-san," said a third voice.

Momoi yelped, flying backwards into the lockers with a clang. Standing at the end of the row, glaring at them through his spectacles was Midorima Shintarou.

Tsukino met his green eyes with her dead fish ones.

"Forget everything you just heard," she said in her most eerie warning voice.

For a moment, it seemed as though Midorima was going to say something; she could feel the sparks of contempt coming off him. Then, without a word, he opened his locker, retrieved a small teacup and walked away, shoulders squared officiously as if to say he was above their childish tittering.

"Shintarou," called Tsukino.

He stopped, his shoulders twitching probably at being referred to so casually. "Refrain from referring to me so casually, Tsukino."

"Is that today's lucky item, Shintarou?" asked Tsukino.

Sitting behind Midorima for the entirety of first year had meant they were often forced to partner up with each other, which was actually, if she overlooked his personality, a blessing in disguise considering her appalling grades. As such, she had developed a good understanding of his strange habits, particularly his obsession with Oha-asa.

Wearily, he lifted his glasses up the bridge of his nose. "Of course. A Japanese imperial tea cup-"

"Would be a shame if something were to happen to it."

Sighing, Midorima turned away. It worked both ways. Midorima had also become accustomed to Tsukino's idiosyncrasies, including her daily threats to his lucky items. So far, she had never gone further than to mock drop them, then again, he had never given her reason to. He wasn't going to start today. It was simply too tiresome.

"Barbarian," he muttered and then left them in peace.

"Ah Tsukino-san, I appreciate your concern, but you didn't have to threaten his lucky item," said Momoi, staring after Midorima. "He takes those things pretty seriously."

"I know," explained Tsukino. "He used to snap at me if I so much as looked at his lucky item '_improperly'_. But now he's gotten so used to it that it doesn't bother him anymore."

"So… in a way," said Momoi, biting the end of her pen, "you made him loosen up a bit."

Continuing as if she hadn't heard Momoi, Tsukino reflected out loud, "Next time I'm really going to have to break one of them."

Perspiration broke out on Momoi's brow. Unlike most people she knew, Tsukino was jarringly inappropriate, almost as if she was trying to shock people on purpose and Momoi wondered what kind of influences could have made her turn out that way. She was beginning to understand why Aomine, whose patience was generally at a baseline of zero, had pushed her into the canal. However, even if Tsukino was a bit on the unsettling end of the serial killer spectrum, Momoi could sense something uplifting in her manner, a natural easy charisma that made people want to listen to her, no matter how crass she was. This did not bode well if she really was a serial killer, of course.

"Um, Momoi-san."

"Hm?"

"Now what?"

"Well… there's still a bit of time till the end of practice. We could go watch if you'd like. I'm sure Kuroko-kun would appreciate the support."

A disturbing grin widened Tsukino's mouth and she leapt off the bench with newfound vigour.

"Yes, I'm sure Tetsuya would appreciate that."

The usual sound of sneakers met them as they switched from tiled to hardwood floors. She had gone in there fully intending to tease Kuroko to within an inch of his reputation, if such a transparent guy like him could even generate one, but when she entered the gym and saw the boys playing, she paused. It had been a while since she herself had played in an actual game, the last time being before she Oshiro fell out, and the nostalgia of watching one in full flux was bile inducing. She was about to turn away and search for Kuroko when something made her stop.

One of the players had just blazed passed the opposing team's defence, including Murasakibara, a boy who should not have been allowed to be so tall, and scored a layup.

"Momoi-san's boyfriend is not as bad as I thought he would be," said Tsukino, eyes darting side to side as she followed his movements. His speed was ridiculous.

Momoi's cheeks doubled in size and she blew out an angry raspberry. "How many times- _childhood_ _friends!_"

"How long has he been playing?" asked Tsukino, trying to recall if she'd ever seen anyone their age quite as good. Even Ichiro her eldest brother, Teiko's former prodigy, had never displayed such raw, natural talent.

"Since before I can remember," Momoi said with a sigh, unable to keep the smile from her face. "Sometimes I think he has a basketball in his head instead of a brain."

"Hm."

"Is something wrong Tsukino-san."

The next words were spoken in such a bland voice that it seemed to negate all meaning in Tsukino's words. "It's just… I haven't been this turned on a while."

"EH?!"

"She means she wants to play basketball."

"UWAH!?"

Momoi's heart was just about ready to burst. Kuroko had appeared between them, wiping the sweat off his brow. He was wheezing so hard that it looked like he wouldn't be able to hold out till the end of practice.

"W-what?" asked Momoi.

"Kame-san means that watching Aomine-kun has gotten her in the mood to play, although she phrases it poorly," he explained, as he was usually forced to do when it came to Tsukino. "Please don't take offence. She grew up surrounded by a lot of rowdy men so she's developed a very vulgar way of speaking."

"R-right…" Momoi stammered, still trying to recover from the mental image of Aomine and Tsukino in a passionate embrace.

"You make it sound like I grew up in a motorcycle gang or something," said Tsukino, unaware of Momoi's inner turmoil. "Anyway, Tetsuya, shouldn't you be over there with the rest of them."

She nodded at the three-on-three match taking place on one half of the court where Aomine's team was winning only by a small margin, as it was proving challenging for them to get through the mighty purple tree's defence.

The sound of retching reached her ears and turning around she was horrified to find Kuroko kneeling in the corner puking his guts out. He had told her that he was finding it difficult to keep up during practice, but clearly he hadn't been telling her the full story. Approaching him, though remembering to maintain an appropriate distance to avoid any wayward splatter, she knelt down and gently patted his back, wondering why he had felt the need to hide it. Teiko's regime was notoriously brutal and Tsukino was the last person to judge when it came to basketball ability.

"Oh you had today's special for lunch," she remarked flatly, viewing the green lumps of curry swimming in yellow bile. "I've been meaning to try it. How was it?"

But Kuroko was too busy working on dessert to reply.

Momoi had run off to get a mop. A depressed aura seemed to radiate from Tsukino as she tried to weigh up what was worse, mopping up her best friend's fresh vomit or wiping up a stranger's dried urine.

"Want me to tell the coach to let you sit out the rest of practice?" Tsukino asked him when he finally stopped being sick. "Hey, Tetsuya?"

He shook his head, wiping his mouth with his t-shirt. "I'll be fine."

His breathing was still heavy, his skin an off-green colour, the kind you'd expect to see on a sea monster, rippling with Goosebumps.

"The multi-coloured vomit spreading ever closer to my sneakers would beg to differ," said Tsukino, backing up.

"You can't interfere," he said firmly, shakily getting to his feet. Tsukino's hand automatically shot out to steady him, but he batted it away not impolitely. She could sense desperation in his next words. "I have to do this myself."

Several of the players had stopped what they were doing to stare at them. Some of them, having never seen Kuroko play were probably thinking that he couldn't cut it, that he didn't belong in the first-string. Tsukino was about to swing round and issue a long and colourful statement about how they could all go to hell and take their whore mothers with them when Aomine gestured for a time out and ran over.

"You alright there, Tetsu?" Aomine asked, patting Kuroko on the back hard enough to make his cheeks blow up. To Kuroko's credit, he managed to get it under control. "Well either way, you gotta hurry up. Murasakibara says he'll crush you if you don't stop being pathetic."

That seemed to do the trick. Tsukino watched as Kuroko sprinted off without so much as a second glance, grabbing a water bottle on his way and taking a long swig before switching out with one of the other first years. Murasakibara, the exceptionally tall one with purple hair rested his large hand threateningly over Kuroko's head, and all was right in the world again.

"Murasakibara's huge," said Tsukino, voice full of awe. "He's in our year, right? How tall is he?"

Aomine, who appeared to be taking a short respite from training, spurted a jet of water into his mouth from his water bottle before replying. "Ah? One-eighty-five or something."

"That means when he's older he'll probably be like… like two metres!"

"What you got a thing for tall people?" said Aomine, smirking down at her.

"Some may even classify it as a fetish. I prefer to think of it as a healthy obsession."

There was some truth to her statement. It wasn't that she loved the horizontally privileged bastards exactly. In fact, she hated them, with a passion, and had the occasional urge to chop off their legs and sew them onto her torso.

Her eyes glinted as she watched Murasakibara.

"There's nothing healthy about you," said Aomine, observing her warily.

Nanna Tsukino said that Kame had inherited her looks from her, however, since everyone in her family, including both sets of grandparents were amongst giant status, her odd growth was put down to a freak of nature and she was mocked mercilessly by Zinan. This naturally gave rise the green-eyed monster. The figurative one, not Midorima.

"I wonder if scientists are working on leg transplants," said Tsukino, trying to estimate the girth of Murasakibara's legs and whether they'd be compatible with her figure. "I mean they've practised head transplants on animals. If you can transplant a head then legs should be easy."

"Tch, idiot. It's more complicated than that. You don't just sew them on like with a doll."

It was eerie how well he could read her thoughts.

"Plus your body would probably just reject the transplant," Aomine continued, "and then you'd die or end up as an amputee."

"You sure know a lot about this, Ao-chan."

"Kaa-chan likes to watch docu- _Ao-chan_?"

There were witnesses. He couldn't attack her with witnesses.

She took one wide side step closing the gap between them. "Hm, you're pretty tall for a first year too, Ao-chan," Tsukino said, tilting her chin up and batting her eyelids at him so that she looked like she was having a seizure. "What are you… one-seven-five? One-eighty?"

Unfazed at this point by Tsukino's general inappropriateness, Aomine covered her face with his hand and shoved her away.

"Come back when you've grown a few cup sizes," he said, running back onto the court.

"Mazophile!" she shouted after him, earning several disturbed looks.

He merely tossed the water bottle over his shoulder expecting her to catch it and give him an especially cool exit. He didn't count on her moving out of the way and allowing it to drop with a squelch into Kuroko's puddle of vomit.

Couldn't get angry with her for that, she reasoned smugly. It was his own stupid fault.

Unfortunately, the thing about poetic justice was that it was always timely.

From the corner of her eye, she saw Momoi talking with Nijimura. Then she saw Momoi point in her direction. She tried to remain very, very still as Nijimura followed Momoi's gaze and looked over at her. Too late. A flash of recognition sparked in his eyes. Nijimura started walking towards her. He started to grin. Walking faster now, faster, faster, breaking into a run. Tsukino tried to duck back into the changing rooms, but it was too late.

"Hey, brat, almost didn't recognise you with that haircut," he said, voice unsettlingly pleasant as he threw his arm around her neck.

A whole year. A whole entire year at Teiko she had managed to avoid him.

Tsukino's deferent smile was a little feverish as she glanced around the gymnasium searching desperately for someone to come save her. Kuroko met her gaze, immediately gauged the dangerous situation she was in, and turned his back on her.

"So Momoi-san tells me you're the responsibility of the basketball club from now on," said Nijimura, twisting his arm so that she was almost in a headlock. "Good, good. Let's all do our best."

"I'm going to die."

"Slowly but surely."

* * *

As the members of the first-string poured out of the locker rooms at the end of practice, several snuck glances at the human-shaped lump lying face up on the floor outside of the equipment storeroom. Seeing what everyone was staring at, Momoi anxiously ran over and attempted to wake it up.

"Ah, is she dead?" asked Murasakibara, munching on a chocolate bar as he watched.

"Oi Murasakibara, be careful where you spray your crumbs," said Midorima, glaring at him.

Murasakibara opened his mouth wider as he chewed, increasing the spray radius. "Huh? Did Mido-chin say something?"

"Anyone would be dead after being put through the captain's Punishment Trials," said Aomine. To her credit, she'd lasted a lot longer than Haizaki had the first time he had done them.

"Works for me," said Haizaki, smirking lazily as he walked off towards the exit. "Someone else can be the captain's whipping post for a while. See you losers later."

Akashi had remained silent listening to the exchanges of his team. It wasn't until Kuroko appeared kneeling beside Momoi, causing her to cry out in shock, that he spoke up.

"Does anyone know the nature of the relationship between Kuroko and Tsukino-san?" he asked.

"From what I've gathered, they're old friends," said Midorima.

"More like Tetsu's her keeper," said Aomine, clasping his hands behind his neck as he watched them. "If it wasn't for that guy Tsukino probably woulda burned the school down by now."

"He seems concerned for her," said Akashi, observing Kuroko as he took out his water bottle and unscrewed the cap. At first, it looked like Kuroko was going to make her take a sip from it, then he turned it upside down and poured it over her head. "…In his own way."

Tsukino jerked awake screaming while Kuroko stood up and offered her his hand. After glaring at him for a few moments, hair stuck to the sides of her face like a drowned dog, she took it, letting him haul her to her feet.

"You gotta have a pretty strong personality to deal with Tsukino," said Aomine.

"Mmm, like Sachin and Mine-chin."

"Oi, Murasakibara, what's that supposed to mean?"

"_Nothing_."

It was clear to Akashi that a volatile variable like Tsukino Kame couldn't be left unchecked with their phantom sixth man. There was too much destructive energy bottled up inside waiting to spill out. For now, he would have to keep an eye on her.

"Let's go."

* * *

**(1)** In Japan they don't give out detention and practically never suspend students, and expulsion is pretty much like a unicorn. They believe every student has a right to an education and if they act like a delinquent then they're usually deemed a lost cause and ignored. The fact that her father thinks she's going to be suspended means that she's pushed her luck. A lot.


	5. The Demon of the First-String Gymnasium

_A/N: Thank you all for your astounding support, your reviews, favourites, follows and PMs. Y'all are wonderful, especially for putting up with my slow updates. This is the last chapter in the buffer, which is why I was so reluctant to upload it. The next chapter is still being written... comedy is so hard to write D=_

**You Were Conceived Next to a Tortoise Enclosure**

**The Demon of the First-String Gymnasium**

There was a rumour going around about a demon that lived in the first-string basketball gymnasium. Some said its shrieks could be heard echoing through the grounds long after school had ended; others that it feasted on the maiden flesh of virgin girls. One boy, a photographer from the school paper had made the mistake of seeking it out and inexplicably found himself waking up in the bushes, a pair of dirty underwear hooked around his neck. He claimed that he had no memory of the incident and it was said that the demon had cursed him for the rest of his life with unwashable skid marks.

For weeks, the school had been teeming with gossip about the demon. Students would challenge each other in tests of courage to see who could get closest to the gymnasium after practice, squealing in delight as they sped back to their group. It was all just harmless fun.

Only the first-string members of Teiko's basketball team knew the terrible truth.

* * *

"Where do you think it is?" said Nakadan, stretching his triceps.

"Who knows," said Kira. "It probably lurks in the shadows waiting to pick off its victims one by one."

Kira was a big fan of horror movies and Nakadan was a big fan of being gullible.

They had just been promoted to the first-string that morning and since the beginning of practise, they had been peering anxiously around the basketball court searching for any sign of the demon.

"Why does everyone seem so calm?" asked Nakadan, looking around at the unperturbed faces of the other members. Murasakibara was even sneaking potato chips from under his shirt.

"Maybe it has them under their spell," said Kira. "Like a curse. Or-or they're possessed. Or maybe they're host bodies _for _the demon-"

Two hands clapped their shoulders and they squeaked. Turning their heads round slowly, they looked up at the stern face of their captain.

"When I said you needed to stretch, that didn't mean stretch your mouths," said Nijimura. "So what's so interesting that you feel the need to disrespect your superior's orders?"

"Apologies, captain," said Nakadan. "It's just we were wondering where the demon of the first-string gymnasium was lurking and why no one seems to…"

Nakadan trailed off at the captain's unimpressed expression.

"This is getting ridiculous," Nijimura muttered under his breath. He turned to the manager of the first-string, who was sitting on the bench making notes. "Momoi-san, sorry to bother you, but can you take these two idiots to go see her?"

"Go see who?" Nakadan asked, legs trembling, already knowing the answer.

"Who else?" Nijimura thrust them forwards. "The demon of the first-string gymnasium."

* * *

Having been forced to watch her two older brothers go through puberty, Tsukino was no stranger to the disgusting habits of teenage boys. Hell, even she missed the odd shower… or five. But this was starting to take the piss.

"How many times," Tsukino grumbled to herself as she slammed the plunger into the clogged toilet, "do I have to tell those bastards not to overuse the toilet paper?"

Not two days into her punishment, and she had ended up purchasing a pair of black plastic overalls, goggles and a facemask to guard against the unknown myriad of filth she encountered on a daily basis in the changing rooms. And all out of her own pocket too.

"I clean it and they screw it all up again," she grumbled alongside the squelches of the plunger. "No more. They're all going to pay. Every single one of them. I'm going to teach them the meaning of respect!"

These were the words that Nakadan and Kira heard upon being led into the toilets by Momoi. Concealed by the stall, Tsukino's disembodied voice echoed throughout the room. The boys leapt into each other's trembling spaghetti arms. Sighing, Momoi stood to the side and watched the scenario play itself out.

"I'll start with that self-important Captain. I'll plunge his freakin' face off. Ordering me about like a dog. _Polish the floors, wipe the windows, pick up those candy wrappers._ Who eats in the middle of practice? _Murasakibara_. Freakin' Murasakibara. Dead. Dead. Dead. _They're all DEAD_!"

"Oh my god," Nakadan whispered, looking wildly around the room as he clung to his friend. "It's real."

Kira whimpered mutely. No amount of Exorcist re-runs could have prepared him for this.

"Come on you bastard, come _out_," was punctuated by a particularly loud squelch and then the sound of the toilet flushing. "_YES!_"

The stall door was pulled back. A being born of utter darkness stood before them, glassy eyes protruding from its sockets, a wide, white grin that covered the entire bottom half of its face leering out at them. At least that was how it seemed to the two boys clinging onto each other for dear life, too overwhelmed by their fear to notice that the darkness had a zip going up from its crotch, was wearing bright pink wellington boots, and wielding a plunger.

"What are you looking at?" came the muffled voice under the mask.

"IT'S GOING TO PLUNGE OUR FACES OFF!" Nakadan cried out, tripping over his own feet as he scuttled out of the toilets.

Kira remained behind, his mouth open in a silent scream. It was at this point, that Momoi decided to intervene.

"Ah Kame-chan, could you take off your hood please?" said Momoi, gently patting Kira's back. "This is Kira-san. He's a new member of the first-string."

"He thinks I'm a demon too, doesn't he?" Tsukino said in a bland voice, putting down the plunger and yanking her hood and mask off. "What am I? Some sort of circus attraction for you people?"

"O-Ooh," said Kira, regaining his voice as Tsukino lifted her goggles up. He sighed in relief, clutching his chest where his heart was still beating a mile a minute. "M-my apologies, we had no idea that you were just a normal guy. We thought-"

Momoi winced.

"Did you just call me a guy?" Kame asked, eyes terrifyingly wide.

Realising his mistake Kira waved his hands. "No, it was just hard to tell at first glance with all the- Of course you're a girl. I'm-I'm not wearing my glasses and the lighting in here is _really_ bad-"

"Get him out of here, Momoi," Kame said, picking up the plunger, "_Before I plunge the bastard's face off_."

* * *

The whistle blew to signal the end of practise and all the sweaty young men made their way into the locker room. Meanwhile the demon of the first-string gymnasium shuffled onto the court and began collecting all of the stray equipment.

Normally, the grunt work was divided evenly between the whole club, but since the stipulations of Tsukino's punishment meant that she was at the mercy of the basketball team, Nijimura had decided to turn her into their bitch, although he preferred the term slave. Looked like he hadn't forgotten the time Tsukino had thrown a paint balloon at his head during the championships in his first year at Teiko. She had been aiming for Zinan, the small-forward back then, but perhaps she should not have yelled 'I REGRET NOTHING' as her father dragged her out of the stadium.

Locking up the equipment storeroom, Tsukino picked up her sweat mop, headed to the corner of the court and began the arduous task of cleaning the floors.

It wasn't really _her_ sweat mop, she didn't own it, the school did, but she was quite fond of its sleek design and easy-removable microfiber pads that glided across the court like they were made of air. It was nothing like the locker room's mop, which had obtained an indelible patina of unknown substance smelling strongly like the inside of someone's rotten intestines. She had put in an order request for a new one a few days ago, but she imagined Nijimura had probably used it as toilet paper out of spite.

_Prank Idea #32: Hide toilet paper. Replace with their towels._

Giving the gymnasium a once over when she was finished polishing the floor, she let out a contented sound. Quickly checking to see no one had heard said sound, she went over to the cleaning cupboard and placed the mop carefully inside, along with the wellington boots Momoi had lent her, and hung the mask and her overalls on the hook behind the door.

A crash sounded behind her.

Spinning round, Tsukino saw two club members, still in their towels, entangled in the middle of the court, one of them trying to rub soap into the other's face.

Her mouth fell open in horror as the soap stripped away the polish of her previously clean floor, as the suds built up, as all her work went to waste. Some of their teammates had run out to watch the fight, some still wearing their basketball gear, tracking water and dirt everywhere. Tsukino saw red.

Without thinking, she unscrewed the mop handle and strode over to them.

Haizaki had a younger boy in a chokehold and was grinding a bar of soap against his mouth trying to force it open.

"You kiss your mother with that mouth, eh you weasel?" said Haizaki. "Disrespectful underclassmen should know their damn place."

Nijimura ran out then, having taken the time to put on his boxers.

"Haizaki, just what the hell do you think you're doing?" he shouted.

"Ahah, sorry Captain, I just gotta wash this guy's mouth-OW!"

Haizaki scrambled backwards clutching his head. Looking up, he saw Tsukino Kame, a mop handle gripped in both hands, an expression of fury on her face. Before he could express his confusion, she started beating him with it.

Eventually Kuroko, who had taken his sweet time finishing up his shower and putting his uniform back on, appeared between Tsukino and Haizaki. After a few short words, he managed to get her to drop the mop handle and dragged her out into the fresh air.

Handing her his water bottle, Kuroko sat down on the bench next to her and waited for her to calm down.

"He ruined my floor," she said, rubbing her mouth with the back of her sleeve before taking another sip.

"Kame-san, you realise you sound insane," said Kuroko.

"But I worked _really _hard," said Tsukino, slumping, a weak expression on her face. "I used the new polish..."

The realisation of what she had just done was starting to sink in. Not to protect her family honour, or ensure the virtue of a nerdy cosplayer; she had just beaten someone with a mop handle over a dirty floor. That was excessive even by her standards.

"Aren't you a little too old to be throwing a tantrum, Kame-san," said Kuroko, making her cheeks flare red. "Anyway, we should probably go before Haizaki-kun recovers. I don't think it matters to him that you're a girl."

"I don't think it matters to anyone that I'm a girl," grumbled Tsukino.

Some of the members of the basketball club were filtering out now, casting weary glances at the demon of the first-string gymnasium as they went past.

"I see. Someone mistook you for a boy again," said Kuroko.

"You can at least pretend to be surprised."

"It shouldn't matter to you what other people think," said Kuroko, understanding that for Tsukino, who had spent her entire life in her brothers' shadows, that was a herculean task. "What matters is how you see yourself and if that self is someone to be proud of."

She was quiet for a while, staring at her lap.

"Kame-san?"

"I left all my stuff in the locker room," she said, passing his water bottle back to him. "You're going to have to go back and get it."

"Okay. If Haizaki-kun comes out, hide in the bushes," said Kuroko, and then he disappeared.

Tsukino lay down on the bench, fully prepared to accept Haizaki's wrath. It was a bad sign when you were feeling guilty about beating up Haizaki. At least when she'd hooked the underwear around that idiot photographer's neck and dragged him into the bushes, she had been doing so in the pursuit of justice. Justice for taking unflattering pictures of her and then refusing to give her the film, and also justice for having to listen to Midorima's step-by-step instructions on how to wash his lucky underwear.

Was she really this petty?

She blamed it on the lack of sleep. The combination of detention and her late night activities meant that she was getting home around midnight every day, and the physical exertion of both responsibilities was clearly taking a heavy toll on her body. She would have to ask Mareo for a few days off to recuperate, otherwise the demon of the first-string gymnasium really was going to go on a rampage. Taking out her phone, she shot him a text about how she wasn't going to make it tonight and flipped it shut again.

Something landed heavily on her stomach. Opening her eyes, she saw it was her bag and sweater. Aomine towered over her, hair still damp from the shower, smelling strongly of the pine-scented soap he used. She had become overly familiar with the smells of the first-string members, bad and good. Aomine was surprisingly one of the good ones, but she suspected that was Satsuki's influence.

"Tetsu got called aside by Akashi to discuss stuff," said Aomine. "He said to go ahead without him."

"Ah, thanks," said Tsukino, tugging on her jumper that was two sizes too big and used to belong to Zinan. That was one bad smell she was never going to get rid of.

"Heard you beat Haizaki with a stick," said Aomine, quirking an eyebrow.

"It was a mop handle actually."

"What did he do?"

"Murdered my first-born child."

"Ah."

They headed towards the gates together, Aomine watching her from the corner of his eye, Tsukino lost in thought. Expecting to part ways at the intersection, she raised a hand in farewell, only to find that he was not crossing the road as he usually did.

"Stalking is a criminal offence," said Tsukino as he walked along beside her.

"As if anyone would wanna stalk you," said Aomine. "Satsuki said you're not acting like yourself today. Told me to walk you home."

Except Aomine knew that Tsukino's strange behaviour had been going on longer than just today. Ever since she'd started coming to practice, he had noticed the darkening under her eyes, the constant yawning, the mood swings. One time he had caught her with her head in her locker, completely dead to the world. Of course, he had immediately picked her up and stuffed her inside, all without her waking up. She had yet to figure out that he was the culprit. At least he hoped she hadn't.

Aomine knew Tsukino Kame was far from a model student, her reputation as a troublemaker was legendary, but in all the time that Aomine had known her she had never seemed this stressed out.

Maybe it was the shifting of the status quo that was bugging him or the fact that a stressed out Tsukino was far more dangerous than a happy one, but either way he didn't like it.

"Yeah, I won't hear the end of it from Satsuki if I don't walk you home," Aomine muttered.

"And here I was just thinking that Aomine-sama was finally returning my feelings," said Tsukino.

"A-Cups aren't allowed to confess to me."

_Prank Idea #33: Cut out all the boobs in Aomine's gravure magazines._

"I give you permission to take your leave of me, Aomine-sama," said Tsukino, flourishing her arm as she bowed. "I shall tell Momoi that you fulfilled your duty like a true gentleman. That you even gave me your cardigan when you caught me shivering in the cool night air. And finally, when we got to my doorstep you whispered the words every little girl wants to hear from her prince charming: 'Hey baby, I got a huge co-'"

Without much effort, Aomine pulled her jumper over her head and tied the sleeves with her arms still inside around her neck so that she looked like she was the victim of a bizarre straitjacket. Then gripping her shoulders, he pulled her onto the floor where he left her flailing like an upturned tortoise.

As she kicked her legs in the air, her skirt rode up on her thigh and Aomine shook his head. Of course, Tsukino would wear shorts underneath, he thought as he walked away.

When she finally got free and caught up, she refused to speak to him, her face red with fury.

_Prank Idea #34: Switch out Aomine's sports drink for sawdust._

_Prank Idea #35: Put chilli powder on Aomine's towel._

_Prank Idea #36: KILL AOMINE'S CRAYFISH._

If Aomine was disturbed by the creepy grin that had appeared on her face, he didn't comment on it.

* * *

A week later and Teiko was rife with rumours of a new development. The demon was in fact the spirit of a cross-dressing basketball player who had died in the locker rooms after being beaten to death by a bigoted janitor. Now the spirit walked the halls plunging the faces off all those who dared to look upon its mutilated form.

Sitting at a table in the cafeteria, Tsukino stared at nothing in particular while the rumour mill spun, surrounding her with the hum of former victims, cursed pink wellington boots, and surrogate basketballs breasts. That would throw all the proportions out of whack, was all she could think as she nudged a piece of shrimp with her chopsticks. Socks worked much better. She knew this from experience.

Sweet Buro had been waking up extra early to make her a bento, mostly because Tsukino had told him if he didn't she would take the lock off of the downstairs toilet. Still, she couldn't muster up an appetite, despite how sore and exhausted she was from the previous night. Perhaps it was the continued speculation about her sexuality that was getting her down, but as she glanced at the black and green phone sitting on the table next to the bento, she knew it was something else.

Since her request for a night off after the Haizaki incident, Mareo hadn't contacted her or answered any of her calls. Neither had anyone else in the group. She could only presume that she had offended him, which weighed more heavily on her conscience than she would have liked.

"I wonder what would happen if you stood up on this table right now and announced to the student body that you are the demon of the first-string gymnasium," said Sakata Riyeko, placing her tray next to Tsukino and sitting down. "A murmur of 'that makes sense' perhaps."

Tsukino sighed loudly and continued to move the shrimp around with her chopsticks.

"Did you happen to see the Swim Club's newsletter I sent out this morning?" asked Sakata, watching her play with her food. "It has a special on dietary advice. It is based on the shocking revelation that humans need to eat to survive."

Tsukino glanced up from her shrimp at her new best friend. "Your subtlety never fails to amaze me."

"Thank you," said Sakata, splitting her chopsticks and rubbing them together. "I apologise in advance for what I'm about to do."

"Huh?"

Without warning, Sakata stabbed her chopsticks into the shrimp and stuffed it forcibly into Tsukino's mouth.

"MMPH!"

Before Tsukino could recover, Sakata proceeded to shovel the rest of the bento down her throat, going so far as to pinch Tsukino's nose when she tried to resist.

"You need to eat to keep up your strength if you're going to become a first-rate swimmer, Tsukino-san."

Five minutes later the bento was empty and Tsukino's head lay on the table, bits of rice and food stuck to her cheeks, feeling utterly violated.

"Excuse me, may I join you?"

Sakata recoiled, raising her chopsticks into the air as she looked around for the source of the noise. Her eyes widened when they landed on the pale apparition standing just inches away from her face. Tsukino grabbed her wrist before she could do something dangerous, like feed Kuroko to death.

"Sakata, this is Kuroko Tetsuya," said Tsukino.

Kuroko nodded, taking a seat opposite them. "We've met previously."

Sakata's grip loosened round the chopsticks. "We have?"

"You're on the library committee."

"Yes. It's nice to meet you."

"It's nice to meet you also."

An awkward silence fell as they stared at each other. Tsukino realised that they were sizing each other up, the way fighters do before a match, the new and the old best friend. She had to admit this stroked her ego a little bit.

"Tsukino-san is a massive brat."

"I agree."

Tsukino dropped her head back on the table. "Between you two I'm going to develop a complex."

"Would that be in addition to your height, breast, and middle child complex?" asked Sakata.

"Bastard. You're really testing my patience," said Tsukino, chin jutting out in a poor attempt to appear menacing. "If I wasn't so tired from running laps I would kick your ass right here."

"Why were you running laps?"

"A spirit was chasing me-"

"Nijimura-senpai caught her trying to put chilli powder on Aomine-kun's towel," Kuroko explained before Tsukino could complete her spin on events.

"He peaked under my skirt!"

"Your tall-tales are becoming more and more ridiculous. Aomine-kun isn't a masochist."

Lifting her head, Tsukino shot him a dirty look. "You're accusing me of tall-tales when there are people around us who think I'm a demon. No, better, they think I'm a cross-dressing demon who plunges the faces off of bigoted basketball players."

"When you put it that way, Kame-san, you sound like a cool super-hero."

"You're not funny, Tetsuya."

"I thought it was funny," said Sakata, face devoid of expression. "Hah hah hah."

"Thank you."

Muttering curses under her breath, Tsukino chucked her bento into her bag, informed them she was heading back to class to take a nap, and slipped out of the cafeteria. Really, she just wanted to use the free time to try and call Mareo again without having to suffer Kuroko's judgement.

Walking towards her classroom, she tried his number, but after a few rings, it went to voicemail. Ignoring her after all then, she thought, pocketing her phone. It couldn't be helped. After practice, she would have to go there in person and see if she could plead for forgiveness. The very thought made her skin crawl.

There was the sound of a shutter going off and Tsukino spun towards the noise on instinct. In the distance, standing unapologetically in the centre of the corridor, was _him_.

"What?" she yelled, shaking her fist at him. "Didn't get enough of Midorima's skid marks the first time?"

The photographer took one last photo of her stomping angrily towards him, and then made a mad dash for it.

"Troublesome bastard," Tsukino muttered under her breath before giving chase.

As she rounded the corner, she collided with what felt like a wall and fell sprawling to the ground.

"Ah… it's Skino-chin," the wall drawled lazily as it munched on a chocolate bar. Murasakibara reached out his free hand and pulled her effortlessly to her feet. "Huh? Something on my face?"

Tsukino had been eying Murasakibara with a look of bitter envy from the moment she recognised him.

"Skino-chin?" asked Murasakibara, tilting his head to the side as he observed her expression. "Did you hit your head when you fell? Ah, maybe you should see a nurse?"

Remembering why she had been running in the first place, she put aside for now the mental cursing of his generational line, and returned to scanning the corridor.

"Murasakibara, did you see which way some four-eyes with a camera just went?" she asked the giant. "He came through just before I did."

There was a long pause while Murasakibara processed her question. Then he shook his head. "Sorry."

She clawed her face in frustration. "Damn it!"

"Want me to help you look?"

Tsukino looked up at him between her fingers. "Hah?"

"For cleaning up my wrappers," said Murasakibara, voice muffled as he took another bite of his chocolate. "Aka-chin scolds me when I leave them lying around, especially since I'm not meant to be eating during practice."

"A-ah."

Tsukino wasn't about to tell him that she had in fact been collecting all of the wrappers so that she could stuff them into his locker at a later date.

"So then I'll help?"

"Uh, sure."

"_Yaaaay_," he cheered in a bland voice.

His apathetic demeanour was starting to make her wonder if her usual style of pranking would have even affected him.

_Prank Idea #42: Lace Murasakibara's sweets supply with laxatives._

"So this guy is a member of the school paper I think," said Tsukino, pointing down at the end of the corridor where the hallway forked. "We'll split up. You go left. I'll go right. Brown spiky hair, glasses, a camera and about this tall-" She lifted her hand slightly above her head. "-If you find him, bring him back here at the end of lunch. Got it?"

Murasakibara nodded and started trudging along at a snail's pace. Well it was better than no help at all, she supposed, running ahead of him, wincing at the pain in her legs.

Tsukino spent the rest of lunch searching for the bastard, but with no luck. The newspaper and photography clubrooms were both empty and there was nothing in there to give her a hint as to who he was or which classroom he was in. She'd tried asking a few people if they'd seen the demon's underwear victim, but it seemed his legend had surpassed him and people were even starting to claim he had died of fright. Five minutes before the end of lunch, she gave up and headed back to class.

As she turned into the corridor where she was supposed to meet Murasakibara, she was surprised to find that he had actually shown up, and that he wasn't alone.

"Uh… Murasakibara, who do you have there?" asked Tsukino, peering round his shoulder.

"I found Megane-san." Murasakibara prodded the boy cowering in his shadow, urging him forwards. "See."

Brown spiky hair, glasses, a camera and slightly taller than her. Tsukino scratched her head.

"I commend the effort, but he's not our guy."

"W-w-w-w-what's going on?"

"Oops. My bad," Murasakibara said to the boy, brushing the imaginary dust off his back. "Got the wrong one. Here, have a lollypop."

"S-s-s-so I can go?" asked the boy, clutching the lollypop in trembling fingers.

"Yes… Actually wait!" Tsukino hooked him round the elbow before he could leave, glaring sharply at the camera around his neck. "You're in the photography club?"

"Y-y-y-y-y-yes," said the boy, shrinking so far into himself that she thought he was going to melt into a puddle on the floor.

"The photographer, the one who got attacked by the demon of the first-string gymnasium, do you know who he is?"

"Eh, but isn't Skino-chin the demon-"

"_Not now, Murasakibara!_" she hissed, eye twitching as she held the boy up in her iron grip. At this point, she was the only thing keeping him from collapsing. A sinister grin stretched her face. "Give me a name and a class and we'll forget this ever happened."

"Hitoshi!" cried the boy, bursting into tears. "Tayama Hitoshi! Class 2-B! Please don't kill me. I have a pet goldfish and my mum never feeds it. It would _die_ without me."

Tsukino released him. He scrambled to his feet and sprinted away, his cries echoing in the distance.

"That was fun," said Murasakibara, sucking on the lollypop he had stolen back while the boy had been distracted by his fast shrinking bladder.

The bell rang marking the end of lunch and the hallway started to fill up as people returned to their classrooms. Reaching into her bag, Tsukino took out the chocolate bar that she had been saving for later. No one could say she didn't repay her debts. Well everyone could. She was actually pretty shit at returning favours, which was probably why Kuroko never lent her money anymore. But she had to admit, despite his height and tendency to leave all the candy-wrappers on the floor, Murasakibara wasn't such a bad guy. Plus, she was pretty sure it was out of date. She held the stale chocolate bar up to him.

"For your-" It was out of her hands before she could complete her sentence. "-Troubles."

"_Thaaanks."_

The two of them headed towards their respective classrooms together. When they reached Murasakibara's, he laid his hand down heavily on her head and stopped her from leaving. She was about to swing round and ask him just who the hell he thought he was when he spoke.

"After school, I'll help Skino-chin find Tayama."

A few minutes later, Tsukino entered the classroom with a strange look on her face. Midorima raised an eyebrow as she walked past his desk and sat down. Sakata also noticed and immediately reached into her bag for the spray bottle she had started keeping on her persons to discipline Tsukino. Aomine, who was snoring at his desk, jerked in his sleep, mumbling something about crayfish.

"Sakata," Tsukino said in a dazed voice.

"Yes, Tsukino-san?" asked Sakata, extending her arm and aiming the spray bottle at the nape of Tsukino's neck.

"Tall people. I may have misjudged them."

"Your one-sided, mindless prejudice is at an end then?"

"Who knows…" said Tsukino. Her eyes narrowed and she kicked Midorima's chair. "I can see you eavesdropping, Shintarou."

"It's not eavesdropping if you speak at the volume of a bullhorn, Tsukino," said Midorima, throwing a glare over his shoulder.

"WHAT WAS THAT, SHINTAROU? I COULDN'T HEAR YOU!"

_SQUIRT_

"Sakata! You bastard! I'm not a cat!"

_SQUIRT_

"Save that incredible lung capacity for the swimming pool."

* * *

**Author's Note:**

I am oddly proud of this chapter, as it seriously deviates from the original story that I had written and also bred several new comedic scenarios. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed it. Thanks for being so patient with me. Always looking for/open to feedback, especially about the humour, the realism of the characters and the plot, so please let me know in a PM if you'd like to discuss, as I am back on schedule for review/PM replying. Murasakibara was a PAIN to write, because I try not to use the ~ symbol, which would make it a thousand times easier, honestly.

The Haizaki and Sakata moments were probably my favourite. I could barely stop laughing as I wrote them, so please let me know if they landed properly. In my head they're both very abrupt and shocking.

Kudos to anyone who can anticipate what happens next xD Next chapter is thought out, but not written since I've hit a wall, which was what had made me reluctant to update this one, but it's been too long to go without an update.

Hope you enjoyed this chapter!


	6. Tayama Hitoshi and The Lucky Underwear

_A/N: A thousand thanks. Again buffer is non-existent so updates will be slow!_

**You were Conceived next to a Tortoise ****Enclosure**

**Tayama Hitoshi and The Lucky Underpants**

Standing in the middle of the court, Nijimura watched the first-string run warm up laps, his brow wrinkling. Something was amiss.

"Oi, vice-captain."

Splitting from the group, Akashi ran over to Nijimura, a sweaty sheen covering his face. "Yes?"

"Murasakibara and Midorima are absent."

"Perhaps they're running late. Midorima mentioned something about being on cleaning duty today."

"Notice something else?"

Akashi made a quick sweep around the space, eyes narrowing on Momoi as she nervously poked her head out of the locker rooms.

"Tsukino-san is absent," said Akashi.

"_Tsukino-san is dead_."

* * *

It had been his own foolish curiosity that had led to this, although Midorima would never admit it.

As he'd been emptying out the bins during cleaning duty, he had spied Tsukino talking with two girls outside class 2-B accompanied by none other than Murasakibara. The bizarre, never seen before combination had warranted further inspection and so inching closer, Midorima concealed himself behind an open door and rather surreptitiously tried to listen in on their conversation.

"Tayama-kun didn't show up to class after lunch," said one of the girls. "I remember because he's usually so punctual."

Tsukino's face had gone pale. She had seemed nervous, anxious even, a rare emotion to be displayed by such a one as the demon of the first-string gymnasium. As class representative, following up on this sort of thing was Midorima's responsibility, which was the reasoning he had used when he ducked behind a recycling bin.

"You wouldn't happen to know where _Tayama-kun _might have gone?" Tsukino had asked. "I have something important to give him."

The two girls exchanged glances.

"Why do you want to know?" asked the other girl. Quite sensibly too. Giving that kind of information out to just anyone, especially Tsukino Kame, a known delinquent, was never a good idea.

And then Tsukino had done something that had gone beyond Midorima's scope of reality. Tilting her head to the side and smiling sweetly, she pressed her hands to her cheeks and said, "Well, of course I'm going to confess to him."

Then she pulled out an envelope with a heart sticker sealing the opening. The two girls had given it one look, nodded their understanding and immediately divulged his location.

Frozen at the thought of Tsukino being able to display any emotion beyond the range of little angry ball of hate, Midorima hadn't been able to get out of the way before Tsukino and Murasakibara came by and discovered him.

And that was how he had ended up crouched behind a bush wedged between two of his least favourite people monitoring Teiko's gardening shed for reasons still unknown to him.

"Remove your foot from my leg, Murasakibara."

"Eh, it's your leg that's under my foot," said Murasakibara, munching on some biscuits he had produced from his bottomless schoolbag.

"Stop whinging, Shintarou," said Tsukino, shading her eyes with her hand. "No one's stopping you from leaving."

"As class representative it is my duty to-"

"Just admit you're nosy," said Tsukino. A lewd grin appeared on her face. "Or is it that you're secretly in love with me."

"I would rather BLEEP a donkey."

Tsukino slapped her hands over her mouth to smother the laughter.

"Mido-chin sounds really weird when he swears," said Murasakibara, making a disgusted face as Tsukino tipped to the side, rolling in the dirt.

Readjusting his glasses, Midorima cleared his throat and tried to draw the focus back to the objective at hand.

"Tayama Hitoshi. You still haven't explained why you're hunting him," said Midorima. "Something like confessing seems impossible for you, Tsukino."

Brushing the tears from her eyes, Tsukino patted Midorima on the shoulder.

"As a reward for making me laugh, I will tell you. He stole your lucky underpants."

"That BLEEP!"

While Murasakibara was holding back Midorima, and Tsukino was trying not to choke, another story was being strung together inside the gardening shed.

Blackout curtains had been placed in front of the windows to prevent any natural light from entering so inside the only sources of light were the two deep red safelights sitting at opposite corners of the shed. A shadowy figure scampered quickly from one end to the other, hunching over a workstation where pieces of paper swirled in an aluminium tub filled with dark liquid. Above it, hung three lengths of clothesline. Photographs dangled from them and as you moved from picture to picture the narrative gained greater clarity.

The first photograph, interrupted by a thumb was of a tiny vicious looking blur speeding down a hallway pursued by a gang of students twice its size. Further down the line was a picture of a figure with an abnormally round, shaved head, the light glinting off it at an angle so that the face was obscured. It was shouldering a suspicious lumpy sack out of the science department. Steadily the quality of the cameraman's photography skills (as well as his stalking capabilities) improved and the subject came into focus. In parts at first. Eyes like slits. A glare as cold as the armies of the dead. Cropped hair lengthening into corkscrew curls. Teeth so big, it looked like the head had been grown around it as an afterthought. Then as a whole.

It could have played like a flipbook animation, tracking the growth of its subject, though with few changes to its overall size.

Twenty pictures in total.

There was a slosh as Tayama Hitoshi hauled a plastic bottle full of developing agent onto the workstation and poured it out into one of the tubs. He unclipped the last picture drying on the clothesline and held it in the air.

"Not in this one either," he muttered, scratching his head. "Where did it go?"

An arrangement with the school's groundskeeper (involving the groundskeeper being a generally swell guy), meant that the darkroom had been set up with what Tayama Hitoshi believed was the utmost discretion. Not that he would have had anyone to tell. His one and only friend was currently ignoring him in favour of a goldfish. So he was reasonably horrified when he heard the thumping at the door.

"This is the Disciplinary Committee!" said the voice on the other side.

Tayama Hitoshi stood stock still in the centre of the room. A bead of sweat slid down the tip of his sharp nose and split in two. He recognised the voice.

"Come out with your hands up!"

"Return the stolen undergarment you have in your possession at once, thief!" said another voice.

"_Shut up, Shintarou, you're ruining it."_

"_I told you we are not playing cops and robbers!_" There was another thump on the door. "Open up at once! I will have you answer for your crimes. _Murasakibara, break the door down_."

"Ah, fine."

The next thump shook the entire shed.

"As you can see we have a battering ram. This is your last chance to come out peacefully, Tatami Hitoshi."

"_Tayama Hitoshi_."

"Tayama Hitoshi."

Tayama Hitoshi quickly plucked all the photographs off the clothesline and stuffed them into his backpack along with the rest of the negatives and his camera. Casting one last hopeless look at his darkroom, which certainly would not survive Tsukino Kame, he pulled down one of the blackout curtains, pushed the back window open and leapt through it, landing on the grass at the opposite end of the shed. Back pressed up against the wall, he listened.

"Put a bit more force into it, Murasakibara. This is not the time for indolence!"

"_Eh,_ if Midorin wants to try it so badly, he can-"

"Move aside, amateurs!"

There was silence for a moment and then-

_CRASH!_

Tayama Hitoshi winced as he imagined all of the natural light flooding the darkroom and ruining all of the underdeveloped photographs.

"Skino-chin is kinda strong, huh?"

"Barbarian."

"All about the weakest point in the door, boys. You have to make sure you kick it right where its weakest or you'll…" Tsukino's voice began to fade as she entered the shed.

Tayama Hitoshi took his chance. Still crouched, he darted round the side of the shed and broke into a full run, heading towards the school without sparing a look over his shoulder. If he had, he might have noticed the hawk like gaze fixed on his back.

Tsukino Kame had only ever met one other person who could outrun her and since she had decided that Aomine Daiki was not a human but in fact an alien on steroids, she was feeling pretty confident. About fifty meters away now.

Tsukino bent her arm behind her neck as she started to limber up.

Anyway, a head start would make it all the more sweeter when she strangled him to death with his camera strap.

* * *

"This is lame," said Aomine, holding his hands behind his neck as they walked along the corridor. "Why do we have to be the ones looking for Tsukino?"

Momoi gave Aomine a weak smile. Practice was the one thing the basketball idiot looked forward to all day and having to postpone it for a wild goose chase that would probably end empty handed or in tears didn't seem fair to him. Unfortunately, as Kuroko had rightly pointed out, Aomine was the only known person able to outrun Tsukino.

"Think of it this way, the faster we find Kame-chan and the others, the faster we get back to practice," said Momoi.

"And the faster the captain gets to thrash Tsukino," Aomine said with a smirk, beginning to see the bright side.

"Really, Aomine-kun, be more sympathetic. Don't you think the captain is a little hard on her? I'm surprised she didn't run away sooner."

"There's a reason she's called the Demon of the First-String Gymnasium, Satsuki," said Aomine.

"You're just mad because she cut out all the boobs in your gravure magazine," Momoi said slyly.

"_She defaced Horikita Mai!"_

"Technically she de-boobed her," said Momoi, raising a hand to her mouth to cover the smile.

"That's not funny-"

Aomine threw his arm in front of Momoi, his eyes narrowing.

"Aomine-kun…?"

There was a thoughtful look on his face, the same look he got when he was focussing on a difficult problem, one Momoi rarely got to see it off of the basketball court. She looked into the empty hallway and tried to figure out what had caught Aomine's attention. Then she heard it. The sound of running.

"Looks like we found her," Aomine said, pushing Momoi behind a row of lockers.

"How can you be so sure its Kame-chan?" asked Momoi.

"Because someone's screaming."

"I don't hear any-"

Right on cue, the terrified gargle of someone running for their life exploded into the hallway. Pressing his finger to his lips, Aomine leaned against the side of the locker and waited. The poor nameless sod ran past them first and Momoi barely caught a glimpse of his spiky black hair before he disappeared down another hallway. Then all of a sudden Aomine's arm shot out.

"THE HELL!" screamed Tsukino, dangling from Aomine's hand like an angry Chihuahua. "Put me down!"

"Please calm down, Kame-chan, the captain-"

"You're letting him get away!" bellowed Tsukino. "

"Yeah, yeah, I'm sure he deserves it," said Aomine, leaning in and fixing her with the kind of scowl an owner does its pet after it chewed up the furniture for the umpteenth time. "Now tell us what you did with Murasakibara and Midorima."

"Come closer, Aomine," Tsukino said in a dark whisper, "so I can bite that ugly nose of yours off."

"You little-"

"Aomine-kun, calm down-"

"_Look_, I don't have time for this. I need to catch that guy," said Tsukino, swinging her arms and legs in a futile attempt to escape.

"He murder your first born child as well?" Aomine asked dryly.

"Actually," exclaimed Tsukino, a look of horror passing over her features, "he's been sneaking into the girl's locker rooms and taking pictures of innocent, unsuspecting girls in their underwear!"

"I don't believe you."

"He even has pictures of you, Satsuki. You know, in your battle underwear."

Momoi gave Tsukino a sympathetic smile and rubbed her arm in a placating manner. "I'm sure he does."

"I'm telling the truth!"

"You never tell the truth," said Aomine.

And then, as if the planets had aligned, something glorious happened.

"COME BACK HERE YOU UNDERWEAR PERVERT! YOU WON'T ESCAPE."

A shock of green hair zoomed passed them and disappeared around the corner. A long period of gloomy silence followedin which the smugness slow-dripped off of Tsukino like tar, the told-you-so-smile ringing with the promise of bringing-it-up-later when she had more time to gloat. Then the silence was broken by a horrified shriek. Aomine clapped both his hands over his ears, letting Tsukino go in the process. She was gone in a quick second.

"Satsuki, calm down!" Aomine shouted.

"_That pervert has pictures of me in my underwear!" _shrieked Satsuki, her face a shade of red one might imagine dripping down a volcano. _"Don't you tell me to calm down!"_

Teeth gritted, Aomine let out an exasperated groan and started running.

* * *

"I see we have some new faces here today," said Konishi Mino, captain of the girls swim club.

The sun was beginning to set, casting shafts of warm, purple-red light through the swimming pool's high windows onto the surface of the water. On the stands, several rows of swim club members sat clad in their swimsuits and swim caps, hanging on to the every word of their highly decorated captain.

Konishi could not help but smile at seeing how much the club had expanded since the beginning of the year, her smile turning especially proud when she met the eyes of her number two standing diligently at the side. Almost single-handedly, Sakata Riyeko had succeeded in reviving the girl's swim club, pursuing new recruits day after day. The girl was insatiable. Konishi couldn't wait to meet the newest member Sakata had scouted for the team. She was meant to be the greatest natural talent to ever walk through Teiko's doors.

"I would like to go over again some of the rules and regulations we must all abide by while using the pool," continued Konishi. "First, and most important, no running in the-"

There was a crash as the double doors on the other end of the swimming pool flew open and a boy came in, his arms pin wheeling as he skidded to a halt just before he went over the edge of the pool.

"Girls' swim club is currently in session," Konishi shouted to the boy as he glanced this way and that. "I'm going to have to ask you to leave."

Ignoring her, the boy began running round the side of the pool towards them. Sakata looked like she was about to say something, when the double doors directly behind them crashed open.

"Thought you could lose me in the cafeteria, did you, Tamagotchi?" called a chilling voice.

Of all the members of the swim club, Sakata was the only one not to gasp at the sight of delinquent and all-round menace as she strode in, a piece of lettuce caught in her mess of hair.

"It was clever of you to distract Murasakibara with the frozen desserts section, I'll give you that," said Tsukino, whipping the piece of lettuce onto the floor as she advanced towards the boy, not unlike a cheetah with her careful, measured movements. With each step she took forwards, the boy took one backwards. "But now it's time to pay the Pinocchio."

"Piper," muttered Sakata, vowing to buy Tsukino an actual book one day.

"Members of the girl's swim club only!" Konishi barked at the interlopers.

"Guess it's a good thing I signed up," Tsukino snapped back.

"Tsukino Kame is not a member of my swim club," scoffed Konishi. "I would know if Tsukino Kame was a member of my swim club…" Konishi caught Sakata's eye and instantly deflated. "Wouldn't I?"

"Although she has not yet signed the mandatory participation forms, Tsukino-san is a part of the mailing list, and would therefore be considered a member of the club," said Sakata.

"This is the talented new member you've been talking about, isn't it?" Konishi whispered, looking very unsure.

"I have never seen someone more suited to be in the water."

"Oh God. Tsukino Kame is in my swim club."

Just then, the same set of doors the boy had come through opened and Aomine Daiki slipped inside. The giant ketchup stain that was covering the majority of his shirt might have accounted for his grim expression as he planted himself imposingly at the other end of the pool. The boy stopped shuffling about, a deeply perplexed expression dawning on his face as if he were trying to weigh up his options and retain influence over his bowels all at the same time.

"Looks like you don't have anywhere to go," said Tsukino, a manic grin splitting her face.

"Really? Her?" Konishi said weakly.

Sakata walked over to Tsukino, who took a break from staring down her prey in favour of acknowledging her newest best friend.

"While I am visibly euphoric that you have finally decided to attend one of the swim club meetings, Tsukino-san," Sakata said expressionlessly, "your lack of proper attire and clearly violent motives are upsetting the captain. Please leave and return in your swimsuit, which I know fits you because I saw you trying it on in the girl's locker rooms when you thought no one was around."

"You know what you do constitutes stalking, right?" said Tsukino.

"Not legally. I checked."

"Of course you did," said Tsukino, sighing and rubbing her temple. "Look, if you let me finish my business, I promise I'll come to swim club tomorrow. I'll even bring those things you bought me-"

"Inflatable armbands. They're mostly used for infants."

"Yes, I'm aware," Tsukino said stiffly.

"Your terms are acceptable," said Sakata.

"You have my back right?"

"Naturally."

"You're the best," said Tsukino, smiling so big she looked like Pacman with teeth.

Tsukino walked over to the boy by the side of the pool, whose eyes were the size of saucers behind his thick spectacles as they darted between herself and Aomine, who was carefully moving towards them.

"There's no escape. You're surrounded," said Tsukino, sounding very much like a Bond villain. "Aomine's impossible to get through. Trust me, I have the bald spot to prove it. And even if you got round me… Well, have you ever been tackled by a robot?"

As he stared at her, she realised then that the hairs on the back of her neck were standing up, not because there was anything threatening about him, quite the opposite. It wasn't easy for someone to make Tsukino feel uncomfortable, but he was doing it.

"I have a good explanation for everything, I promise," he said. "I just can't give it to you right now, not until I'm finished."

"Lucky for you, Tammy, I don't need an explanation," said Tsukino, stepping forwards.

"Tayama Hitoshi," said the boy, smiling feebly at her. "And sorry… for this. I know it's the deep end."

It took a second for Tsukino to register what he had meant, but by then it was too late to react. Her foot caught on something, maybe his leg, and she lost control. Someone shouted her name. Aomine. But it was too late. She was already falling. There was a splash and-

Sakata ran forwards as soon as she saw Tsukino start to fall. Plucking a float from the stand, she dove into the water and swam towards the centre of the pool. The force of the push combined with the fact that Tsukino had never even learned to tread water meant that she had sunk on her back like a medicine ball. Underwater, Sakata could see the bubbles exploding from her friend's gaping mouth, the panic in her eyes as she squirmed desperately to right herself. Sakata sped up. Hooking an arm around the drowning girl's waist, Sakata kicked off the pool floor and pushed them up to the surface where Tsukino spluttered madly for breath.

"She can't swim!" Sakata heard the captain shout incredulously as she positioned Tsukino's arms on the float. "She's in the swim club and she can't even swim!"

Swimming them to the edge of the pool, Sakata felt Tsukino being pulled away from her.

"You're alright, Tsukino," Sakata could hear Aomine saying as she pulled herself out of the pool and crawled over to them. "Tetsu always said that a little drowning would do you some good."

A choked laugh escaped amidst all the coughs.

Aomine sat Tsukino up, patting her back with one hand while the other squeezed her arm. He remembered that he hadn't been this careful with her when he'd pulled her out of the canal, running away almost as soon as he got her onto dry land. Feeling her tremble against him as she retched up water, he felt his hand tighten around her arm.

It didn't take long for Tsukino to get back to herself.

"Where did that bastard go?" Tsukino demanded as Sakata was draping a towel around her.

"Presumably he knew that I would shirk any attempts of capturing him to rescue you and escaped through the back doors," said Sakata.

"Is that your roundabout way of admitting that you love me?" asked Tsukino, beaming.

"Yes."

"Sweet."

"Idiot," Aomine snapped suddenly. "Who the hell stands at the edge of a swimming pool when they don't know how to swim?"

"You were much less concerned when _you_ pushed me in the canal," Tsukino pointed out slyly.

"Yeah, well," he muttered, looking embarrassed. Were all women mind-readers? "You didn't go under that time."

Tsukino leaned in. Aomine froze. "Your act doesn't fool me, Aomine Daiki," she whispered. "Just because there are witnesses this time you're trying to play the hero, huh? _You make me sick_."

To which Aomine responded by biting her nose.

Tsukino was able to borrow a gym uniform Sakata and went to the locker rooms to change. Aomine sat outside on the floor and they conversed through an exchange of grumpy bellows. Practice was almost over and he didn't see any point in returning empty-handed (since there was no way Tsukino was going to come without putting up a fight) just to get chastised by the captain.

"I'm going to get a bruise!" Tsukino called, inspecting her sore nose in the locker mirror.

"You deserved it!" Aomine shouted back, though he was not sure this was true.

"Do you think Midorima caught up with Tayama?" asked Tsukino, kicking her pile of wet clothes into the gym bag. At least she wouldn't have to do any laundry tonight, she thought, unaware of the difference between chlorinated water and washing up liquid.

"Nah, he said he was going to the art room to get glue for his lucky item. Poor bastard looked like someone had died."

"I can't believe you, me, Murasakibara and Midorima couldn't catch up to him. How fast is he?"

The door opened and Tsukino came out wearing an oversized sweatshirt and a pair of tracksuit bottoms, Sakata's gym bag slung over her shoulder. Even Sakata's clothes were loose on her, thought Aomine, getting to his feet.

"He wasn't faster than us," Aomine said sharply, "he just knew his way around better than us."

"Of course," said Tsukino, snapping her fingers. They nodded at each other enthusiastically. No way he was faster than them. "He would have to know all the hidden nooks and secret passageways if he wanted to fulfil his dream of becoming my stalker."

"No one dreams of becoming your stalker," said Aomine, but Tsukino wasn't listening.

"Tayama Hitoshi's going to regret ever trying to stalk me," Tsukino said as they started walking down the corridor at an easy-going pace.

"Probably gonna regret a lot of things," said Aomine, pulling at his shirt and glaring at the dry ketchup stain. "You owe me a new shirt."

"Ketchup washes out," said Tsukino, waving him off. Idly, they turned at the end of the corridor, heading in the opposite direction of the first string gymnasium.

"How would you know? You never do laundry."

"If you can get blood out, you can get ketchup out."

There was a sharp _thwack_ as Aomine smacked her upside the head. "Don't say such creepy things," he muttered. "Jheeze."

Clutching her sore head, Tsukino glared at Aomine. "How's your Horikita Mai magazine?" she asked darkly.

"In better condition than you're about to be," Aomine said without missing a beat.

"I'm going to murder your crayfish."

"I'd like to see you try."

"Don't worry, I'll make you watch."

They pushed open a pair of double doors and exited onto the quad. Eyes locked, sparks flying, they bickered all the way across the field.

"… _with barbed wire and then when you can't cry anymore tears I'm going to feed them to you_."

Aomine rolled his eyes. "How are you meant to tie me up with those skinny little arms?"

"Womanly fighting spirit."

"You're not a woman."

"_Oh yeah?"_

Tsukino grabbed the bottom of her t-shirt prepared to yank it up and bear all, or nothing, depending on how you looked at it, but Aomine merely placed a hand on her face and pushed her over without breaking stride.

"Moron."

Scrambling to her feet, Tsukino leapt onto his back with the litheness of a howler monkey, seizing hold of his ears like they were the reigns of a horsey.

"_Get off!"_ Aomine shouted, as he tried to shake her off, but she had managed to knot her legs around his waist and all that running away from her brothers and climbing up trees meant that she had thighs of steel.

"_Say I'm a woman!"_

"_Not in this lifetime, demon!"_

Aomine reached up and clawed a fistful of her hair, eliciting a guttural war cry. In return, Tsukino, apparently desiring to test out the hypothesis that with enough willpower one could compress the several years it took to achieve ear stretching into a short few seconds, started pulling.

Ten minutes later, sore, bruised, and in Aomine's case, a little embarrassed, they lay panting on their backs in front of Teiko's gardening shed.

"You're a monster, not a woman," said Aomine, his chest rising and falling quickly.

When Tsukino didn't respond, he looked over and once again found himself being made uncomfortable by the expression on her face. She was glaring up at the sky, her lips pursed tightly into a line and if it were anyone else, he might have been worried that she was upset. Tsukino didn't get upset though. It wasn't an emotion she was meant to feel. People had been calling her a nuisance and a delinquent since before Aomine had even met her so what would it matter if he…

"Oi, Tsukino…"

But Tsukino had already gotten up, kicked open the door to the shed and disappeared inside. The sound of smashing and clattering quickly followed.

"Want some help?" he awkwardly called, getting to his feet.

An expensive looking piece of equipment came rolling out of the doorway and stopped by his feet, the state of it suggesting it had been torn apart by wolves, which in this case wasn't much of a stretch. Tsukino poked her head around the door and Aomine saw, hanging from her fingers a small fuel tank, the kind you could detach from a lawnmower. He gulped.

"No thanks," she said brightly, before disappearing again. "You two might want to leave. Accessory after the fact and all."

Pulling out his phone, Aomine quickly dialled Kuroko's number. A familiar ring tone sounded behind him. Sweat broke out on his brow as he turned slowly and grimaced at the sight that met him.

Kuroko pulled his phone out of his pocket and placed it to his ear, his expression unchanging. "Hello."

"Don't answer it, moron!" snapped Aomine.

"Sorry, I couldn't resist," said Kuroko, putting his phone away.

"How long?"

"Long enough to know that your crayfish will never be safe again."

* * *

**Author's Note:**

This has been sitting at the editing stage for a while now. More action heavy, so hopefully the humour still comes through! Can anyone make any predictions about what Tayama is really up to? I left a few clues. Have to say I love writing interactions between Tsukino and Sakata.


	7. The Merciful God Akashi Seijuro

_A/N: Thank you to the readers who continue to support this very slow story, to the reviewers, favouriters and alerters too. Y'all give me joy._

**You were conceived next to a Tortoise Enclosure**

**The Merciful God Akashi Seijuro**

"Do you know why you're still alive?"

"My winning personality."

"Wrong."

"You're in love with me-"

"The reason I have not tied you up and dragged your sorry arse over to Yamamoto-sensei is because of the deep respect I hold for your brothers."

"So you're in love with them."

There was thump and then a whimper.

From a safe distance, the first-string pretended not to listen as Tsukino received her lecture, accompanied enthusiastically by corporal punishment.

In the end it had been thanks to Kuroko's intervention that Tsukino did not burn down the shed. Made every piece of equipment inside look like it had been run over by a steamroller, yes. Carved banners of curse words into the wooden frame, yes. Been caught squatting in the corner with her skirt hiked up and an expression on her face that could have been interpreted as straining… yes. Kuroko had explained that burning the shed down would have been a waste of such pure delinquent genius. Then taking her by the hand, he had led an unsuspecting Tsukino back into the building and right into the waiting clutches of Nijimura Shuzo.

"It seems a little unfair that Kame-chan is taking the brunt of the punishment," Momoi said as she passed Aomine a water bottle. "Midorin and Muk-kun were skipping too."

Midorima had turned up with a meticulously bandaged stuffed bunny rabbit cradled protectively in the crook of his elbow and Momoi had discovered Murasakibara fast asleep in the industrial freezer surrounded by frozen lollypop wrappers.

"Captain will get to them later," Aomine said, watching as Tsukino was made to kneel, a medicine ball balanced on her head like a trained seal.

"Recite the Japanese National Anthem," ordered Nijimura.

That's easy, thought Aomine.

"That's easy," said Tsukino stupidly.

"Backwards."

She can do that, thought Aomine.

"I can do that," said Tsukino stupidly.

"In English."

Doomed, thought Aomine and Tsukino.

* * *

Tayama Hitoshi did not come into school the next day. Or the day after that. Or even the day after that. In fact, a whole week passed before Tsukino decided to give up and stop lurking on the roof like some sort of constipated gargoyle armed to the giant teeth with paint balloons and her trusty slingshot. After some polite enquiries, some of which involved holding a goldfish hostage, Tsukino learned that Tayama had decided to take his summer break a few weeks early so that he could go and visit his sister in the states. It definitely had nothing to do with the psychotic little imp that had been posting drawings through the slit in his locker, and while the crayon stick figures couldn't be considered feats of artistry, they got their point across well enough.

Regret was not a good enough word to describe how Aomine had felt when he wandered over to Tsukino's desk and found her hunched over a piece of photo paper she'd stolen from the shed, scribbling maniacally. Of course, he had been stupid enough to ask what it was.

"See this line here," said Tsukino, pointing at the page and looking up at Aomine with wide, terrifying eyes. "This is a laser beam."

The ensuing conversation kept Aomine awake for the next three nights.

Once Tsukino learned that Tayama Hitoshi had fled the country, the erratic behaviour did settle down, made easier by the fact that Nijimura had her on an even tighter leash. This included forcing Aomine to accompany her to and from classes and practises. There was a lot of protesting at first, mainly on Aomine's part, but then they both looked into the eyes of their captain and tacitly agreed that spending more time with each other was definitely better than spending time in the dark hell Nijimura would put them in were they not to comply.

"What's for lunch?" said Aomine, dropping into the desk opposite Tsukino where Midorima usually sat.

Lifting up her bag, Tsukino tipped it upside down on the desk, shaking out her multi-layered bento. "Buro told me to tell you that he hopes you like it and that your feedback on his Yakisoba was useful in creating a new recipe."

She passed him his compartment and his mouth watered upon seeing the contents.

"Gonna have to thank your brother in person one day," said Aomine, shoving an entire pork cutlet in his mouth.

"By the way, I think you have another admirer," said Tsukino.

"Oh yeah, who?"

"Arai said some tall blonde was asking a lot of questions about you today."

"Was she cute?"

"Supposed to be a model."

"Boobs?"

"I'd give them an A."

Tsukino took a long swig of her water bottle before resting her chin in her hand. The sun was getting higher every day, and today the sky was especially warm. Her eyelids fluttered.

"Aren't you gonna have some?" Aomine asked between mouthfuls.

"Maybe later."

Despite the strict schedule Tsukino was on, Aomine had noticed that the circles under her eyes were only getting darker.

"Oi, what time did you go to bed last night?" Aomine asked suddenly.

"Like two or something," said Tsukino. If she was surprised by the line of questioning Aomine had taken, she didn't show it. They'd been forcibly attached at the hip for a week now. Tsukino was beginning to think of him as a supernumerary nipple.

"What happened to getting twelve hours of sleep a day?" said Aomine. "At this rate you're going stay a midget for the rest of your life."

"What can I say, I had better things to do."

"Yeah, like what?"

"Terrorising the townsfolk, stealing candy from babies, knocking old women down with my bike, you know, the usual," said Tsukino, letting out a long, gaping yawn.

Aomine's chews grew more aggressive as he stabbed a chopstick in her direction.

"Have you looked in a mirror lately? You look like a raccoon dog."

"Ah, did Aomine-kun just inadvertently call me adorable?" asked Tsukino.

"Tch," he grunted, looking very unimpressed. "Only idiots sacrifice their health for their boyfriends."

"What are you talking about, Aomine-kun? I don't sacrifice my health for you."

Aomine slowly placed his chopsticks on the table. "You're the one that started the rumour that we're dating."

"Two days after Nijimura stuck us together," said Tsukino. Picking up his chopsticks, she began popping pieces of Sushi in her mouth.

"That explains the condolence cards in my locker," said Aomine, pushing the rest of the bento towards her. He'd had a fair bit already anyway.

"I want the names of all those people."

"Why?"

"So I can give them a reason to condole."

"Why did you start that stupid rumour anyway?"

"People kept coming up to me and asking me why I was spending so much time with you," said Tsukino, biting into a cutlet and continuing with her mouth full. "And then Goldie McRiding Hood threatened to tell the disciplinary committee that I was harassing the great, magnificent Aomine Daiki so of course, I had to tell her the truth."

"We're not in love."

"We're totally in love."

Aomine snorted.

"No way they believed you just like that," said Aomine

"Not at first, but then I started bringing you home cooked bentos and you started walking me to class," said Tsukino, bopping his nose with her chopsticks. "It was like the story of Beauty and the… what was the name of that big hairy rat?"

"Beast," Aomine said slowly, reminded of why Tsukino was almost bottom of the year. "That's a story about Stockholm syndrome."

"A whale as old as wine," said Tsukino, polishing off another piece of unagi.

"Did your parents find you in a zoo?" asked Aomine. "Or did a travelling circus throw you out of a moving caravan?"

"So," said Tsukino, belching wetly, "June wedding?"

Lunch continued in much the same fashion; Aomine insisting that Tsukino talk to a psychiatrist, Tsukino insisting on wild hydrangeas for the garland flower arrangements, not that she knew what wild hydrangeas looked like, or for that matter, garlands. Occasionally, Tsukino would mention a feature of their wedding that even hypothetically Aomine could not abide and he would find himself suddenly arguing the pros and cons of having a one-man band with an accordion for live music. It was during a heated debate over what the song for their first dance would be (they had narrowed it down to the _Sailor Moon Theme Song_ and _Please God Anything but The Sailor Moon Theme Song_) that Tsukino's phone started to vibrate.

"Who is it?" Aomine asked as Tsukino turned the phone over.

"It can wait," said Tsukino. She yanked out a notepad from her bag, smacked it down on the table and poised a pen over it with furious conviction. "This requires my full attention. So, we'll be serving the guests crayfish at the reception, agreed? It's cheaper than lobster and you're so good at catching them, Aomine-kun."

"Sometimes when I talk to you I imagine myself crashing through the window just to get away," said Aomine.

"And the other times?"

Before he could respond, her phone vibrated again. When Tsukino picked it up to turn the vibration off, Aomine caught sight of the caller ID. It wasn't unusual for Mareo to ring Tsukino at all times of the day, but it was unusual, highly unusual for Tsukino to reject his calls. In fact, the only other time he had seen her do it was when Kuroko got knocked out during a practise match with another school.

"So?" asked Tsukino, putting her phone out of sight.

"So what?" said Aomine, lost in his thoughts.

"What do you do the other times?"

"I imagine you crashing through the window."

"I bet you catch me. That's what boyfriends do."

Aomine blinked, picked up her notepad, and with a sweep of the arm, flung it effortlessly into the trashcan beside the teacher's desk.

"You just lost your horse-drawn carriage privileges, young man."

"We are not getting married, Tsukino."

* * *

"If you're having a June wedding then I'll have to move some things around to accommodate you," Sakata said as they walked to their respective clubs that afternoon. "Most of my weekends in June are spent training for the summer meets."

"Actually, I think June is too far away. I don't think I can wait a whole year," said Tsukino, cocking her head back. "What do you think, Aomine-kun? September. It'll be near your birthday."

"You're both idiots," Aomine muttered as he trailed behind them.

"Naturally, I am to be a bridesmaid."

"Naturally," said Tsukino. "And Midorima will be my maid of honour."

"I will not!"

"Ahah! Eavesdropping tsundere!"

"Bullhorn barbarian!"

"And what will I do in the wedding, Kame-san?" a ghost of a voice said beside them.

Aomine reared back and nearly tripped over his own feet, Sakata flinched but otherwise maintained her decorum and Midorima began sweating profusely. The only one who didn't react at all was Tsukino.

"Hurry up, Aomine-kun, if you're not with me when we walk through those doors the captain's going to string us both up from the hoops," she said.

Aomine swung an arm around Kuroko's neck.

"Yo, Tetsu, you gonna stay late to practice this time?" said Aomine, grinning down at him. "By now you should be more used to the training regime right? It's a pain in the ass with just Tsukino. She spends the whole time sleeping."

"I have some business to take care of after practice," said Kuroko.

"What's more important than training with your partner, huh?" asked Aomine. "Plus we've got that practice game coming up with Haranishi, and you're not as effective on teams you've played before."

Kuroko didn't respond.

Tsukino and Sakata were still discussing the wedding arrangements. Sakata was trying to veer Tsukino away from a dress with a long train, arguing that its size would only draw attention to her lack thereof. Sighing Aomine let his arm slip from around Kuroko's neck.

Tsukino giving Kuroko the silent treatment hadn't seemed like a big deal at first. She was notorious for being melodramatic and Kuroko handing her over to Nijimura seemed like the perfect opportunity for her to flaunt her best King Lear impression. Except no weeping monologues followed, no exclamations of betrayal, no leaping out of bathroom stalls with shaving cream and clippers. Only silence. Aomine started to think that Tsukino might actually be upset, but broaching the subject with her was taboo. Her lips would twist together and she would look firmly in the other direction until you started talking about something else. Midorima maintained that she was being childish (after all, they had once witnessed Kuroko throw her bag in the bin after she called him garbage face), and Momoi insisted that it would blow over soon enough.

Since Aomine was a firm believer of not getting involved in things that were none of his business, he had gone along with Tsukino's desire to not talk about it. Then he started catching Tsukino staring at Kuroko during practice and he would feel the urge to say something. Not that he ever did. Tsukino put as much stake in his opinion as she did a fruit fly, which could be demonstrated by her insistence that they get married in an _ice cream parlour_… Not that they were getting married at all! Aomine cursed under his breath.

Arriving at the gymnasium, the demon and her supernumerary nipple met eyes with the captain to show that they had fulfilled their end of the bargain before splitting up. Along with Kuroko and Midorima, Aomine made his way to the locker rooms, while Tsukino headed over to Momoi who was sitting on a bench chewing the tip of her pen as she poured over a thick red binder. So engrossed was she that when Tsukino plopped down beside her it took her a full five minutes to notice she wasn't alone.

"Uwah!" exclaimed Momoi, almost jamming the pen into the back of her throat. "Kame-chan, how long have you been sitting there? Jheeze, don't tell me Kuroko-kun's been giving you lessons on misdirection. That's all I need."

"What's that?" asked Tsukino, nodding her head at the binder.

"Player profiles of Haranishi's first string," said Momoi, shifting the binder so that Tsukino could have a better look. "The coach asked me to revise their line-up for next week's practise game. They've been training extra hard ever since the last time we beat them and it might be difficult with just our second-years, especially since Haizaki's been so unreliable recently."

"Haranishi," muttered Tsukino. "That sounds familiar."

"It was Kuroko-kun's first game," said Momoi, her smile fading as Tsukino's expression darkened. "Still not talking, huh?"

"So what duties has the captain lined up for me today," Tsukino said loudly. "Polishing the weights? Pumping up the basketballs? Removing the lime scale off the underside of the urinals with a toothpick,_ again?_"

"Actually," said Momoi, perking up, "you'll be happy to hear that the captain has decided to let you off. I mean you'll just be doing normal managerial duties like the rest of us but still-"

Turning slowly, her mouth parting so wide it looked as though her jaw was about to unhinge and clatter to the floor, Tsukino gaped at Momoi.

"U-uh, well," said Momoi, inching away, "Aomine-kun's been complaining that you haven't been sleeping or eating properly and how the captain's been unreasonable these last few weeks overworking you, so I had a word with Akashi-kun and he agreed to speak to Nijimura-senpai at the beginning of today's practice, which he did. And there you have it."

"This isn't a dream," said Tsukino, leaning forward so that she was uncomfortably close to Momoi's face. "This is really happening."

Momoi leaned back. "Yep. You're free. Sort of."

Tsukino threw her arms around Momoi's neck and squeezed until the circulation started to cut off.

"Thank you, thank you, thank you," said Tsukino, releasing Momoi when she started to choke. "You don't know how much this means to me. If I had to scrape another piece of gum off a bench, I was going to show up in Murasakibara's room in the middle of the night with a pair of dental pliers. I had it all planned out. _No anaesthetic_."

Massaging her throat, Momoi almost screamed when she saw the look Tsukino was giving her. There was no constipated grin, no evil glint in her eyes, only a look of pure reverence. Momoi found herself missing the serial killer of whom she had grown so fond.

"Momoi, whatever you need," said Tsukino, "as long as it is under twenty thousand yen because that's all I have in my savings account, or if it's something that can be stolen. Or maybe you want Buro. He cooks and cleans, and so long as you don't lactate in front of him, he's reasonably well-adjusted."

"Really, it's fine," said Momoi, trying to yank her hand free of Tsukino's vice grip. "And it's Akashi-kun you should be thanking. Honestly, I was a little surprised when he went for it-"

"Of course," said Tsukino, shooting up from her seat, a determined expression on her face. "Where is he?"

"Changing, but it can wait until after- Oi, Kame-chan, you can't go in there!"

But it was too late; Tsukino had already exploded into the changing rooms.

"Demon alert!" shrieked Nakadan, running headfirst into his locker in a poor attempt to flee.

"Oi, Tsukino, you're not supposed to be in here," said Aomine, pulling his shorts up quickly, but Tsukino wasn't paying attention. She marched over to the vice-captain, who, fully clad in his gym gear, was sipping from his bottle of water.

"Akashi-san."

_Akashi-san,_ the first-string thought simultaneously in shock. The demon never addressed him so respectfully, usually preferring to call him _that-red-head, what's-your-name-Aka-something_, or even _Nijimura Number Two._

"Tsukino-san," said Akashi. "I assume you're here to…"

The rest of his words trailed off as Tsukino lowered her head in a deep bow.

"Thank you, Akashi-san," said Tsukino. "I am forever in your debt. Whatever you want is yours, but not my collection of Takeshi Kaneshiro DVDs, I'm sorry, anything else. My first-born?"

There was silence as the first-string held their breath.

Delicately, Akashi touched Tsukino's shoulder and she straightened up, gazing at him, eyes sparkly with admiration.

"Your dedication to this team hasn't gone unnoticed," said Akashi, smiling a little weakly at the sorry excuse of a demon in front of him. "Please… continue your hard work."

"Is there anyone you really hate? I could shave their head off," offered Tsukino.

"Tsukino-san, you should return to the court. Not all of the team have finished dressing and I think Nakadan may have just passed out."

Haizaki kicked the lump of human that was heaped up on the floor. "Yep."

After Tsukino had glided dreamily out of the changing rooms, Nijimura walked over to Akashi.

"I'm guessing she doesn't know about what's in the box yet," he said to Akashi. "When are you planning on telling her?"

"I thought we should let the demon of the first-string gymnasium enjoy the next few days," said Akashi, placing the rest of his things inside of his locker. "There's no rush."

"You're turning out to be one hell of a sadist," said Nijimura, shaking his head.

"Of course not. This is entirely for the benefit of the team."

Meanwhile, a pale phantom sat on the bench behind them taking note.

* * *

The change was instant. Instead of staying until long after everyone had gone, Tsukino was now allowed to go home with the rest of the managers, free to spend her evenings as she pleased. No more slave labour did mean that the first-string, which had grown accustomed to a certain standard of pampering, had been forced to pick up the grunt work but this seemed an acceptable sacrifice for the ability to walk safely through the hallways. No more peering around corners for wayward basketballs, no more poking their towels with sticks in case of fire ant infestations, and no more underwear disappearing and then reappearing stapled to the chalkboard in homeroom the next day with their names written helpfully underneath. Things for the basketball club and its demon were beginning to look up.

But there was one, slight hiccough.

"Akashi-san," said Tsukino, trailing after Akashi with a water bottle. "Make sure you stay hydrated."

"Akashi-san," said Tsukino, trailing after Akashi with a towel. "Don't let the sweat get in your eyes."

"Akashi-san," said Tsukino, trailing after Akashi with a protein bar. "Keep up your muscle mass."

"Akashi-san, Akashi-san, Akashi-san," grumbled Aomine as he and Momoi walked home from school. "Doesn'tshe have any respect for herself? What happened to the demon of the first-string gymnasium, huh? Now she's more like the- the- the lapdog of the first-string's… vice-captain."

Momoi patted his shoulder. "Aomine-kun, you're exaggerating. Today I saw her pass you a towel during practice."

"She threw it in my face," grumbled Aomine, stuffing his hands into his pockets. "Said I looked like a drowned rat and that I was making Akashi-san look bad."

It used to be that he and Tsukino walked home together since they were normally the last ones out of the gym. But ever since master gave Dobby a- ever since Tsukino started leaving early, Momoi had kindly decided to stay behind and keep her childhood friend company, something she was beginning to regret.

"Kame-chan is just very grateful that Akashi-kun put an end to the punishment trials," said Momoi, sighing. How much longer was she going to have to put up with his whining?

"Yeah and the only reason he did that was because _you_ asked him to. Tch, Satsuki, this is why I keep telling you to mind your own business."

Momoi gasped, hands curling into tight fists. "Yeah, well, _I_ only did that because _someone_ was worried about Kame-chan's health, and that _someone_ wouldn't leave me alone," she said, crossing her arms over her chest and glaring nastily into space. "The nerve of this guy."

Aomine walked on in silence.

"Wait, Satsuki, who are you talking about?" he asked finally.

Momoi's scowl grew more terrible and she began muttering to herself. "For days this basketball idiot's been complaining and when I do something nice for him he still can't stop complaining. Why do I even bother? Idiot, moron, thug-"

"Oi," said Aomine, watching fearfully as her face turned pink with rage. "Oi, Satsuki."

"-Make sure he wakes up on time, I let him borrow my notes, I cook for him-"

Realisation dawned on Aomine and he came to a sudden halt at the intersection. "Wait… are you talking about me?"

"And do I ever get a thank you? No!"

"Really, Satsuki, who would thank you for your cooking?"

"UGH!"

Aomine leapt back as Momoi swung her bag at his face, putting a good few feet between them.

"_Satsuki!_"

"Walk home by yourself, you ungrateful lout!" snapped Momoi, hitching her bag onto her shoulder and storming off.

"We live on the same street," Aomine called after her, receiving a rather rude gesture in return. "Ah, whatever."

Staring at the four-way intersection, Aomine contemplated following her until she cooled down, but then he remembered the thick red binder that was in her bag and started walking in the other direction.

Soon he found himself on route to Tsukino's house. Well since, he was already on his way… plus Tsukino had been a big fan of basketball once upon a time… which wasn't surprising considering who her older brothers were. Maybe he could convince her to lend a ball and come play some one-on-one.

Turning onto the street she lived on, Aomine was as usual a little irked by how neat and orderly everything was. It was very modern unlike Aomine's street, which was entirely made up of traditional Japanese housing, and he guessed that this must have been a part of the new cheaper housing initiative he'd heard about from his mother. As he drifted further down the street, getting closer and closer to the Tsukino residence, he felt the eyes of the sun-hatted neighbours converge on him as they mowed their lawns, watered their plants, pruned their hedges and swept up their statues, which had been smashed to pieces…

Aomine stared at the cupid head, lying in the fountain basin. Desecrated by black sharpie pen, the monobrowed eyes bore into his soul. Lifting his gaze, he was met with the scrutinising glare of a middle-aged lady with rolled up sleeves and trousers, and a wide-brimmed yellow sunhat on her head of cropped brown hair.

"You're friends with that Tsukino brat, aren't you," she said.

Aomine shrugged.

"The whole street's seen you with her," she continued, hurling a plastic tarp over the decapitated cherub as if it could serve any protection against the town hoodlum. "I'm warning you; The Watch has a zero tolerance policy for thugs."

Then she seized hold of the cupid head and nearly tipped forward from the sheer weight of it. Aomine stepped forwards to assist her, but she reared back, a wild glint in her eyes.

"Don't you come near me," she barked, swinging the head over her shoulder as if she was going to fling it at him. "Get going then. And when you see that little menace, you tell her I'm going to the police this time. I've got witnesses."

"Uhuh."

He walked off, shooting nervous glances over his shoulder in case the neighbour changed her mind and decided to bludgeon him to death. Climbing the steps to the Tsukino household, Aomine asked himself just what he was thinking, but it was already too late, he was here now, so he might as well ring the-

The door creaked open and a tiny figure crouched low at the opening.

"What are you doing, Tsukino?" said Aomine, staring down at the imp with a tired expression as she crept through the little gap and shut the door softly behind her.

"Mama Tsukino wants me to help feed number five," Tsukino hissed, scuttling past Aomine down the porch steps not unlike a crab. "Don't stand there like an idiot or they'll see you!"

Aomine strolled down the steps and followed the prone figure as she led them further down the street, watching as she ducked behind garbage cans, leapt over guardrails and flattened herself against fences.

"Looks like you've made a lot of enemies here too," Aomine said, as he received the stink eye from an elderly man hobbling past with an archaic looking walking stick. "Saw what you did to your neighbour's fountain."

"Psssht, she can't prove anything. Plus Old Lady Sumitimo has always had it out for me since the day I was born," said Tsukino climbing out of a trashcan and brushing herself off. "When I was four she told me that the reason I didn't have red hair like the rest of my family was because I had a black soul and that I needed to repent for all the misdeeds of my past lives."

"Ah," said Aomine, following Tsukino and ducking into some bushes. Was he feeling unwell, because for once Tsukino didn't sound unreasonable? "And the old man?"

"Old Man Munkata. He's always complaining about how Mama Tsukino and Papa Tsukino can't keep it in their pants," Tsukino said, pushing through the foliage. "When number five was born the bastard sent round a pamphlet on vasectomies. Zinan and me went to the store and bought a bunch of condoms, filled them up with plain yoghurt and chucked them at his house. It's the only time we've ever worked together against a common enemy."

"What's a vasectomy?" asked Aomine, crawling over a fallen tree stump.

"It's a surgical procedure that stops a man from being able to have children," said Tsukino. "I'll show you the pamphlet later."

"No thanks."

"There's a little diagram showing what part of the penis they cut off-"

With a grunt, Tsukino collapsed flat on her belly with her arms sprawled out as Aomine dug his knee into her back.

"You were saying," he said next to her ear.

"It's the balls, Aomine. They cut off the balls."

"SPECIAL NOOGIE ATTACK!"

"GAK!"

Minutes later, they emerged from the bushes into a small shopping high street, their clothes muddied, rumpled and torn.

"You're a bully," said Tsukino.

"I don't want to hear that from someone like you," said Aomine.

"I'm going to get a bald spot, Jerk."

Seizing the top of her head, Aomine combed his fingers through each section of her hair, peering closely at her scalp.

"No bald spot," he said, releasing her. "Why are you staring at me like that?"

"I'm not staring at you," said Tsukino, turning away. She began marching through the crowds of people.

"You had a weird expression on your face," said Aomine, following behind her.

"You're seeing things," said Tsukino. "All those nights with your eyes glued to gravure magazines, well you know what they say about doing it too much. Makes you go blind."

"Doing what too much?" asked Aomine, a veritable fount of innocence.

She told him.

"It doesn't make you go blind," said Aomine, a tinge of worry creeping into his voice.

"We'll see. Get it?" said Tsukino sniggering to herself. "_We'll see_, because blind. Get it? _We'll-_"

"What are we doing here anyway?" asked Aomine, peering around. There were a lot of teenagers. This must be where all the kids from Kaijou hang out, he thought, recognising the uniform.

"I'm buying a new plunger," said Tsukino. "The old one mysteriously disappeared."

"The one you broke after you tried scaling the building."

"You say potato, I say kumquat."

"That's not even close- _Woah!_"

Spinning round, Tsukino found Aomine with his face pressed against one of the shop windows. In the display, a spotlight shining down on it, was a pair of limited edition metallic red Jordans released three years ago according to the flashing neon sign beside it.

"Only ten thousand sold in the world, two hundred in Japan," breathed Aomine, eyes burning. "When it came out they were gone in a day."

"Look at the price tag," said Tsukino, also pressing her face up against the window. "You could feed a small Murasakibara with that kind of money."

Aomine whipped his wallet out and peered into it. Tsukino watched uncomfortably as the light faded from his eyes. He had the same expression on his face as when he'd found out Horikita Mai had a boyfriend.

"Um, hey… don't- don't lose hope. You could always save up, you know," said Tsukino. "The ice cream parlour needs a new scoop boy. It's not far, look, right over there," she said, pointing at a white and purple store just across the courtyard. "Give it a couple of weeks and you could probably afford…"

She trailed off as one of the shop assistants from the sports store reached into the window display, picked up the Jordans and returned to the front desk. Aomine and Tsukino watched in silence as he sold them to a very tall boy wearing a Kaijou uniform, the hoodie he wore under his blazer hiding his face from view.

"This is why you shouldn't spend all your money on porn mags."

"Shut up, Tsukino."

The Kaijou student who had purchased the Jordans came out of the store and a girl who was also wearing the Kaijou uniform ran over and hugged him. The girl looked very familiar, Tsukino realised with a queasy feeling, like Tsukino had once eaten dinner with her while Papa Tsukino asked the girl probing questions about what she planned to do with her future and her _intentions_. Eyes darting all over the place, Tsukino tried to plot out an escape route. But it was too late.

"Why if it isn't the Almighty Midget Middle Child!" exclaimed the boy, pulling his hood down to reveal a head of curly red hair tied up in a ponytail.

"Zi-nii," said Tsukino, her face crumpling into a look a five year old having a tantrum would envy. "Girlfriend-san."

"A-ah," said the girlfriend, grinning sheepishly. "It's Morita Ami."

"It's easier if I don't get attached, Girlfriend-san," said Tsukino, grinning darkly at the couple.

Aomine elbowed her, shooting pointed glances at Zinan.

"Oh, right. This is my pet giraffe, Aomine Daiki," introduced Tsukino. "Aomine Daiki, this is my horribly disfigured older brother Zinan and his girlfriend, Girlfriend-san."

"Morita Ami."

"Oh, right, Aomine Daiki," said Zinan. "You're Teiko's new ace. Nijimura's told me tonnes about you. Supposed to be the best power forward since Kobayashi."

"Ahah, I guess so," said Aomine, rubbing the back of his neck, and grinning brightly up at the older boy. "And you used to be the small-forward for Teiko, right? I managed to see a couple of your games. Your drive was incredible."

Zinan let out a glittery laugh. "Just doing my part."

In the background, Tsukino made a gagging motion, clutched her throat in both hands and sank dramatically to her knees.

"You didn't happen to catch the game where my little sister threw a paint-balloon at Nijimura's head."

"I was aiming for you," Tsukino muttered before resuming her performance.

"Nah, it was the game against Yomi, when you doubled their score," said Aomine, too engrossed in meeting one of his heroes to care about the ugly lump on the ground. "Watching you make that buzzer beater was what helped me decide to go to Teiko."

"Glad to have been of assistance. Hey, if you're not busy next weekend, why don't you and Kame come and see Kaijou play. It's just a preliminary match for the Interhigh but we're up against Gawako so it should be interesting."

"Gawako High, three-time qualifier of the Interhigh preliminaries," said Aomine, stars practically dancing in his eyes. "Hell yeah, we'll be there!"

Tsukino sat up. "We?"

"Excellent. I'll leave the tickets with Kame. They're front row."

"Come on, Zi, we have to go," said Morita, grabbing Zinan's hand and pulling him towards another group waving them over.

"See you at the game," said Zinan, before being dragged away. "Nice meeting you, Aomine-kun."

"Wait, Zi-nii," said Tsukino, jumping to her feet. "I was banned from ever attending one of your matches. Papa said something about shallow graves and vengeful ancestors."

"Yeah, well, I figure the Almighty Midget Middle Child wouldn't do anything stupid with her boyfriend around," said Zinan, throwing a wink over his shoulder.

"You underestimate my power."

"Ah she's not my-" said Aomine, but Zinan had already disappeared into the crowd of Kaijou students. "Why does your brother think we're going out? Oi, Tsukino, did you tell your brother that we're going out?"

Tsukino glared at him. "Don't worry. I'm sure it won't ruin your chances with him."

Unfazed, Aomine clapped a hand around the back of Tsukino's neck and pulled her into an affectionate headlock.

"Let's go find your plunger," he said, unable to stop himself from grinning. "Oi… what's your brother's favourite food?"

"Crayfish."

* * *

Unfortunately, Aomine's euphoria over meeting Tsukino Zinan did not last the week.

"Akashi-san?"

"Yes, Tsukino-san?"

"Do you like ice cream?"

"While I'll eat it if it's offered as a dessert, I have no opinion on it."

"Not even Rocky Road?"

"Is that the American one with the marshmallows."

"Yeah."

"I still have no opinion on it."

"Hey, Akashi-san?"

"_Yes_, Tsukino-san?"

"Were you dropped on your head as a child?"

Behind Aomine, Haizaki buried his laughter into the crook of his elbow while Midorima readjusted his glasses and glared disapprovingly in the pair's direction. It was well known in the club, made well known by Midorima's incessant complaining, that Tsukino's unforeseeable attachment to Akashi had been interfering with their Shogi matches. In that she would sit between them and ogle Midorima with her dead fish eyes to psyche him out, which she did.

Aomine tossed the mop and bucket that he had been using into the cupboard with a loud clatter. As he turned back round, he bumped into something at stomach level.

"Respect the equipment," said Tsukino, dead fish eyes now ogling him.

Aomine looked at where Akashi was standing all the way across the court, appearing almost relieved, and then back at the goblin trying to tower over him through sheer force of will.

"You got faster," said Aomine, sliding the bucket into its proper place, which Tsukino had neatly labelled.

"I want to be prepared for when Tampon comes back. And the mop."

Aomine gently hooked it behind the door next to Tsukino's black overalls. "Happy?"

"Respect the equipment, Aomine," said Tsukino, slowly walking backwards, "and the equipment will respect you."

"What's that even supposed to mean," shouted Aomine, watching as she returned to Akashi's side. "_Respect the equipment, Aomine_\- tch, like she can even spell equipment."

"Can you?"

Aomine felt his ancestors scream out in terror. He turned slowly round to meet the phantom sixth man.

"Tetsu," said Aomine. "I'm not even gonna ask how long you've been standing there."

"Who did you think was carrying the bucket?"

"…You're lying."

"This is the third time today. Honestly, I'm a little hurt, Aomine-kun," said Kuroko, turning away slightly. "We've known each other for almost a year now."

"Don't be like that, Tetsu," said Aomine, scratching his forehad. "And after all if you didn't have such a weak presence we wouldn't make such good partners. _Yeah_, _yeah_, it's definitely a good thing I can't see you."

"So it's true, Aomine-kun is an insensitive basketball idiot."

"Oi, what's Satsuki been saying about me? Don't listen to her. You know she once set a banana on fire."

"It has been happening a lot more these days. You seem really distracted," said Kuroko. "Ever since you stopped chaperoning Tsukino."

"Eh, no idea what you're talking about," said Aomine, scowling over the top of Kuroko's head. Akashi was gesturing for Tsukino to stay put, which she obediently did, before walking to the top of the court where Nijimura was waiting for him. "Probably you're just getting better at hiding your presence."

"Maybe," said Kuroko following his gaze.

"May I have everyone's attention," called Akashi.

The managers and the members of the first string (including Haizaki who had tried to run before Murasakibara dragged him back) gathered on the court. There was silence. It was rare for the vice-captain to call a meeting, the only other times being when the captain had been absent, but Nijimura had taken a literal step back and given Akashi the floor. Everyone's eyes were on him.

"As you all know," said Akashi, when he was sure everyone was accounted for, "a few months ago we had a unique new addition to our team."

No one looked at Tsukino.

"Tsukino-san," said Akashi, nodding his head at her. "On behalf of the first string, I would like to thank you for your tireless efforts in supporting us."

Tsukino beamed her shark teeth at him.

"And as such," said Akashi. Nakadan and Kira came out of the changing rooms carrying a crate between them and placed it in front of him before scampering quickly out of his way. "We would like to offer you a new position on the team. Please step forward."

Smirking pompously at no one in particular, Tsukino practically skipped over to where Aksashi was standing and leaned over the crate. Her shark teeth disappeared. No one could tell what she was thinking and this made everyone nervous.

"Of course," said Akashi, staring coolly at the crown of her head, "if you refuse this position, you will be asked to resume your previous activities, which, as I understand it, have been taking a great toll on you."

Reaching into the crate, Tsukino lifted out a large fluffy blue head with two twisted horns protruding from it, and an eerily familiar grin on its face.

"So, demon of the first-string, do you accept the position of Teiko's mascot."

Everyone held their breath.

"I guess... if Akashi-san wants me to," said Tsukino. "I accept."

* * *

**Author's Note:**

It's been forever and all I can offer you are my humble apologies and the hope that you enjoyed this chapter as much as I enjoyed writing it. I know I haven't been replying to reviews, or maybe I did, it's all a blur, but if I haven't replied to you just know that I will... one day... maybe when Tsukino takes her next shower. Just know I read and re-read those reviews because they do give me so much joy xD

Can I also point out that it has only taken me 20+ years to clock that you only capitalise nouns in titles. The things becoming a teacher teaches you.


	8. The Model, the Match, and the

_A/N: Thanks everyone for all of your support. All of you keep me going. Appreciate the crap outta ya._

**You were conceived next to a Tortoise Enclosure**

**The Model, the Match, and the Mild-Mannered Mascot**

With only a few more weeks before they broke up, Teiko was crackling. Preparations for the Summer Festival were well underway with a steady output of colourful banners conveyed reverently through the corridors. Those with performances congregated around the various gyms vying for practice space while class representatives and club captains fiercely debated the teaching staff for prime real estate in the quad. There was a tremendous sense of freedom pervading the school. Ties were left loose around necks, blazers discarded entirely, and laughter filled the courtyards as impromptu water fights broke out amongst the first years. Everyone was enjoying themselves.

Well… maybe not everyone.

* * *

It was baby blue. It was huge. It looked like what would happen if that hairy monster from the movie with the doors decided to make a go of it with Satan. And right now, it was dancing in the middle of the quad flanked by several students in hot pants and leg warmers.

You had to give her credit, thought Momoi, cringing as the giant fluffy demon wiggled its bum. She hadn't complained once.

The demon high kicked the air and fell on its back with a thud. Dancers swarmed around trying to offer their assistance but Momoi shot passed them, smiling a little too sweetly as she batted them away. It was for their own safety. If the mask slipped off, or a vicious curse word muttered in a familiar vicious voice was heard they might have figured out who was debasing themselves for the sake of the basketball team, and who was to say what would happen after that.

"You okay, Kame-chan?" Momoi whispered into the tip of the horn.

"You're speaking into the horn again, aren't you?" came the muffled reply.

"Uh," said Momoi, letting go of the horn. "Nope, haha."

The demon tilted its head upwards and leered at her with its permanent felt-toothed grin. Momoi gulped and peered closer, just able to make out the shadow of Tsukino's face through the eyeholes.

"I almost got it that time," said Tsukino, allowing Momoi to heave her to her feet, which was a task and a half considering how heavy the suit was. The manager wondered how Tsukino managed to move let alone cartwheel in that thing.

"Absolutely," said Momoi. "Kame-chan's made a huge improvement since the first time. You could barely lift your arms in the beginning and now look at you."

"Yeah, well, better start from the top," said Tsukino, brushing off the Teiko basketball jersey, which had '00' emblazoned on the front. "Thanks, Momoi."

"No problem."

"Is Mascot-san alright to continue?" one of the dancers asked, maintaining a respectful distance.

The demon smacked its head twice and gave them a thumbs up.

Perched on the edge of a picnic bench, Momoi watched with tentative pride as her friend bounced and twirled and leapt and posed in perfect synchronicity with the other dancers.

The moment Tsukino Kame had donned the baby blue costume a countdown had begun.

It was making the first string very nervous, her unyielding cool in the face of such a humiliating situation. They were even beginning to pine for the old demon, the one who used to slip threatening notes into their lunch boxes and wait for them outside the school gates with a sling shot full of rabbit droppings. Midorima had explained that in the psychological community this was called Stockholm Syndrome. But that didn't stop the team from leaving small offerings in Tsukino's locker; embarrassing childhood photos, original, unmodified versions of their report cards, and letters from their doctor about certain personal conditions. Nakadan had even gone so far as to leave her a copy of the poem he had written for his first-year crush, the one with illustrations.

Yet every morning bought fresh disappointment as Tsukino collected all the prime blackmail material that had amassed overnight and dumped it into the trash.

It was really starting to seem like the reign of Teiko's most prolific delinquent had finally come to an end.

Still, there was that sense of a countdown.

One by one the dancers left bowing humbly to Mascot-san who waved its large fluffy blue claws back at them. None of them suspected that it was Tsukino Kame in the demon suit, largely because she had not cut off their ponytails or threatened to murder their entire family yet. It helped that they all had the utmost respect for the mascot's privacy. In fact, having observed Tsukino on several occasions helping the other girls up or patting their heads reassuringly after they'd gotten a move wrong, Momoi was beginning to think that the demon had grown fond of her little dance troupe in return.

In the changing rooms, Tsukino lifted off the head. Her face was flush and the sweat had matted her curls to her cheeks so that they looked like mutton chop sideburns. A particularly tart smell wafted out from the open suit like an old gym sock that had been fermenting in a toilet bowl and Momoi held her breath as Tsukino began to peel it off.

The manager, always helpful, tried to help with the suit but Tsukino jerked back.

"I've got it," said Tsukino, shooting her a strained grin.

"Yeah, okay," said Momoi, quirking an eyebrow. "So are you feeling nervous?"

Tsukino hopped out of the suit, shoved it quickly into her locker and slammed the door shut with a sigh of relief. "About what?"

"Only a few more weeks until you perform."

"Oh right. Well, you know me. I don't really get nervous."

"Unless Nijimura-senpai is around."

"Yeah well-"

"Or Aomine-kun is chasing you."

"That's not nerves that's fear-"

"Or Sakata-san threatens to publish pictures of you in the pool with the inflatable donut."

"Ah so the witch betrayed me."

"Kame-chan looks so cute in her frilly little swimsuit!"squealed Momoi.

"I really do."

Discarding the rest of her underclothes Tsukino headed to the shower. Spending so much time in the mascot suit meant that she could no longer get away with just her weekly shower. It was now bi-weekly.

"So, you're definitely _not_ planning anything?" Momoi called to her. She was beginning to seriously consider Kira's theory that Akashi had replaced Tsukino with a robot servant. "No pranks at all?"

"Nope," Tsukino shouted above the whir of the water. "Akashi-san wouldn't be happy if I ruined the festival."

"Yeah but it was Nijimura-san's idea right. It would _really_ embarrass him if something were to go wrong," Momoi said encouragingly. She couldn't believe what she was saying. Was this that Stockholm Syndrome Midorima kept going on about? "His girlfriend _is_ the captain of the dance club you know."

"Yeah, I met Ito the other week. She told me if I messed up her dance routine she would superglue me inside the mascot suit and make me dance until I passed out from the fumes."

"Oh yeah, Ito-san is supposed to be a total badass. I heard on their first date Nijimura-san tried to order for her so Ito-san stood up got her own table and ignored him for the rest of the evening. And then she paid for both of them," said Momoi, stars in her eyes.

"Zii-nii told me that when the principal tried to cut the funding for the dance club to give it to the basketball team she held a protest outside his office. _And_ she forced the basketball team to protest with her."

"So amazing! You can see why Nijimura likes her so much," said Momoi. She recalled the night before when Aomine had forced her stay up tutoring him because he'd forgotten about his world history test and added. "I wish I could stand up for myself like that."

Tsukino emerged from the shower in her school uniform, rubbing her hair with a towel. "You're going to be Aomine's bitch forever," she said.

Momoi's cheeks blew up to twice their size but she said nothing. Perhaps because she had long since accepted her fate. Once Tsukino had finished drying herself off, the two girls headed to their respective homerooms.

"Hey, Kame-chan," said Momoi, tilting her head to the side thoughtfully. "Have you ever liked anyone?"

"Aomine."

Momoi shook her head. "I'm serious."

"So am I. Aomine and I are meant to be. Like Romeo and Jill."

"Juliet, Kame-chan. Romeo and Juliet."

"That's what I said, Romeo and Juliet."

"You know they kill themselves at the end of the play?"

"What's your point?"

"Never mind," said Momoi, sighing.

"Does Momoi have someone in mind?" asked Tsukino, watching the manager out of the corner of her eye. "Is that why you're asking me if I like anyone?"

"Acchan and Micchan were talking about it earlier," said Momoi, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. "They said it was weird that I've never liked anybody. But I don't know. None of the boys that confess to me interest me. They're all so similar. Like one of those paper chain things. Do you think I'm weird, Kame-chan?"

"Nope."

"Even if I never like anyone?"

"Nope."

Giggling, Momoi hooked her arm around Tsukino's. "You know, I'm really glad you attacked those disciplinary committee members."

"Masochist."

* * *

Saburo's bento was a masterpiece as usual and Aomine found himself questioning how Tsukino could be related to such a culinary angel. Four tiers of delicately arranged succulence called to him like a siren song. Aomine reached for it eyes wide with greed but Tsukino smacked his hand away.

"Tsukino!"

Tsukino chucked another bento in front of Aomine, one with only two tiers. "That's your one."

Aomine's brow wrinkled as he looked at his much smaller bento, then at Tsukino's, then back at his. His face darkened. "Tsukino… don't tell me you're saving that for Akashi."

"Nope," said Tsukino, beginning to unpack the tiers. "This is all for me."

"Oh right," said Aomine, brightening back up. "When did you start eating so much?"

"It's weird actually. I've just been really hungry lately," Tsukino said thoughtfully. Then she clapped her hand to her mouth. "Aomine-kun, you're going to be a father- GAK."

Aomine released her from the headlock and she fell back down on the desk with a smack.

"You're not human," Tsukino said, rubbing her throat. Had he gotten even faster?

"Right, Demon of the First-String," said Aomine. "By the way, Satsuki told me you're still having trouble doing high kicks in the suit. What's up? You should have been able to do that from the beginning."

"I'd like to see you do a high kick in that suit," Tsukino muttered under her breath.

"Alright," said Aomine, stuffing his mouth full of noodles so he looked like a very angry chipmunk. "Leshgo."

Tsukino's face fell. "Uh… you know what that's okay, I believe you."

"Huh?" said Aomine, swallowing. It wasn't like Tsukino to back down from a challenge.

"I'm sure you can cartwheel in the suit," said Tsukino. Was she sweating? Aomine thought, peering closer. "In fact, I bet you can breakdance in it. Yeah, definitely. Hey! Did you hear Horikita Mai broke up with her boyfriend!"

"_No way!"_ exclaimed Aomine, yanking out his phone and tapping away furiously. "When?"

"Uh… this morning?"

"Why the hell did you wait this long to tell me?"

"Uh…" Tsukino tried desperately to think of an excuse. Of course, she had made it up, but at least for now he wasn't thinking about the mascot suit.

"Doesn't make any sense," Aomine muttered to himself. "I should have been notified about it. And I can't find anything here about a break up."

Tsukino watched as he scrolled through all the news stories with one hand and ate with the other. Minutes passed and Aomine still had not looked up from his phone. Tsukino scowled.

"So what, do you think you have a chance with her now?" she scoffed.

"As much of a chance as you have with Takeshi Kaneshiro," he muttered, eyes glued on the screen.

"In Horikita Mai's last interview she said she didn't like younger men."

Aomine winced. "Takeshi Kaneshiro is planning to retire soon."

"That story was proven to be false," Tsukino said smugly. Then, "_Wait a minute_, the only reason _I_ heard about the retirement thing was because I signed up to his news alerts."

Aomine looked up from his phone and stared at Tsukino blankly. "Satsuki told me."

"Liar."

"Shut up."

Finishing off his lunch, Aomine got ready to go bother Midorima about the upcoming test. Tsukino had also not revised but she reasoned that being the bottom of the year was a crucial position in the intellectual hierarchy and she could not simply abdicate her throne on a whim. Who would act as a shining beacon of hope for all those slackers and anxiety ridden overachievers, who would show them that no matter how badly they did, Tsukino could always do worse? Getting such low marks (minus marks in some cases for disturbingly graphic stick figures) was a burden she had to bear. For the children.

"You know you're full of shit."

"Yes."

As he was leaving, Aomine reminded her for the fifth time that day to make sure she was on time for the Kaijou match tomorrow. And of course, his method of reminding involved threatening to hang Tsukino up from the basketball hoop by her underwear. It was an effective method.

"Ah Zinan-senpai is so cool. I am so ready to see the Tsukino brothers in action," said Aomine.

"Well get ready to be disappointed."

Aomine's hands were clamped around Tsukino's collar in a second. "If you've messed this up for me, I swear I'll-"

"Injured! Ichi-nii is injured," squeaked Tsukino.

"Did you injure him?"

"In a basketball match. He injured it in a basketball match. Ask anyone!"

"Did you pay someone to injure him?"

"No! I mean that's a great idea though… and actually if I had more money-"

"_Tsukino!"_

"I didn't have anything to do with it. It was just a happy accident."

"Happy accident," repeated Aomine, shaking his head. "At least I'll get to meet him."

"Nope. Ichi-nii is staying at home. One of them always stays at home if everyone else is out of the house."

Aomine could see where this was going.

"They're afraid I'll do something to their stuff."

"Even your own family is afraid of you."

"Wary. My own family is wary of me."

Left to her own devices at last, the Demon of the First-String polished off the last of her lunch, belched loudly, and lay down on her desk to sleep.

Whispers and giggles filled the air. Tsukino tried to shut them out but the noises only got louder.

"Tsukino-san?"

She cracked one eye open and stared up at the tall blonde boy standing next to her desk. He shot her a beatific smile. Beatific because this was how Zinan described his own smile. It is worth pointing out that Tsukino thought beatific meant shit ugly.

"Could I have a word with you, Tsukino-san?" asked the blonde boy, raising a hand to wave at his admirers as they crowded around the classroom entrance.

Tsukino propped her head up on her hand and stared at him, her brow crinkled together in deep thought. And then it came to her.

"You're Kise Ryouta," she said.

He laughed a glittery laugh and she was reminded again of Zinan. She gave him a hard look.

"I see you're a fan," he said.

"You featured as this year's heartthrob hopeful on one of the blogs I follow for news about Takeshi Kaneshiro," said Tsukino. Kise beamed at her. "I downvoted you."

"Ahahah," Kise chuckled nervously, searching her face for any sign of kidding. There was none. "Well I guess I'm still a long way from being the famous Takeshi Kaneshiro."

Tsukino nodded very seriously.

"_What a bad attitude."_

"Huh?"

Kise coughed and waved it off with a bright smile. "Eh, I didn't say anything. So Tsukino-san, do you mind if we chatted for a while?"

"Hm," said Tsukino. Her stomach rumbled. Looked like Saburo's bento hadn't been enough to sate the hunger. An idea occurred to her. "Well… I was just about to go to the cafeteria but _shucks_ I forgot my wallet."

"What a coincidence, I was just heading to the cafeteria! Why don't you let me treat you to lunch?"

These were words that Kise would regret for the rest of his life.

_Bingo. _Tsukino shot up from her seat. "I'm not going to upvote you."

Kise had to fight to keep the smile from slipping. "Of course not. I just thought as classmates and fellow members of the basketball club we should get to know each other and what better way to do that than to share a meal."

"Oh right, you're the blonde model that Arai was talking about," said Tsukino, eyes fixed warily on her yellow haired companion as they walked out of the classroom. Kise's fans parted like the red sea, although this may have been due to Tsukino rather than the model.

"That's right," Kise said brightly, pointing to his face as he hurried to keep pace. For someone so short she could sure walk fast. "So take care of me from now on please, Tsukino-san."

"I refuse."

Kise blinked. "Eh."

"I'm still a minor. Sexual relations are out of the question."

Gasps erupted from either side of them. One boy fell to his knees in despair.

"_Eh!"_ exclaimed Kise, horrified. _"That's not what I meant!"_

"Please, Cassava-"

"_You just said my name a second ago!"_

"-Better men than you have tried," Tsukino said, nodding her head sagely. "Sadly, my heart belongs to another."

Here was more familiar ground. Running a hand through his hair, Kise forced the smile back onto his face. "Ah, of course I know you're Aomine-san's girlfriend. Which is why I would never have made a pass at you. Out of respect for your relationship."

Kise was busy trying to rid his head of the disturbing image of men clawing affectionately at Tsukino's feet only to be kicked away. So he missed the way Tsukino's eyes widened when he mentioned Aomine.

"How did you know," Tsukino asked carefully, "that I was Aomine…_kun's_ girlfriend?"

Running his hand through his hair for the umpteenth time, Kise explained how he had sought out information about Aomine Daiki, a player he admired for his inimitable style and in the process discovered he was dating the infamous delinquent Tsukino Kame. Naturally this had come as a shock to him, not a _shock _shock of course, only he meant to say that the pairing had initially come across as unusual, not because Tsukino-san was unusual, of course not, unique was definitely a better word to describe her _and_ having gotten to know Tsukino in the last… three minutes, he realised that she and Aomine were clearly destined to be together.

"So, that's the story. Sounds a bit crazy huh? But I really do want to know more about Aomine-san so that I can make a good first impression," Kise said, laughing with an affected air. Once more he ran a hand through his hair.

When he looked at Tsukino he was pleased to see that she had been listening intently and did not seem offended.

Takeshi Kaneshiro would never run his hand through his hair so much, thought Tsukino, who had watched enough hours of footage to back up the claim. But Zinan would. _Would_ Zinan go so far as to wear a hyper-realistic mask of a known model who attended Teiko just to infiltrate Tsukino's inner circle, gain her trust, and then destroy her. Tsukino wouldn't put it passed him. He still held a grudge over that time she was born.

It did not occur to her that Kise was simply running his hand through his hair to endear himself to her. Then again few people ever tried to endear themselves to Tsukino. Number Five was the only one and his method consisted mainly of peeing into her open mouth while she changed his diaper.

"Tsukino-san?"

"Yes, as Aomine-kun's _girlfriend_ I have much wisdom to offer you, Zii-nii… I mean _Kise,_" Tsukino said slowly, watching his eyes to see if there had been a flash of recognition. "But not here."

Bewildered, Kise asked, "Why not?"

"Too many interpolers."

"Um, do you mean… interlopers-"

"What's that? Anyway, meet me tomorrow outside the Tokyo Plaza at twelve."

"I was really just hoping to have a chat-"

Tsukino drew near to him and Kise resisted the urge to leap back. The boy who had just gotten back to his feet with the help of his classmates collapsed once more.

"You want to get to know Aomine-kun right, my _boyfriend_?" asked Tsukino, fixing him with her dead fish eyes. They were like pools of tar sucking him in.

"Y-yeah."

"Well then you should know that he takes my, _his girlfriend's,_ opinion very seriously. So, see you at twelve?"

An instinctual fear told him that the small packaging was just a clever smokescreen designed to lull him into a false sense of security. Anyone who went to Teiko had heard the stories of the delinquent menace who stalked the hallways armed with paint grenades and permanent markers. Less active as of late but then so was anthrax. Still, Aomine Daiki was the first person to make Kise feel like the world was limitless.

"Sure!" Kise exclaimed brightly. "That sounds great."

* * *

It was not great.

So far, the manipulative little garden gnome had wrangled _five thousand yen_ out of him on food alone. Not to mention the additional purchases at the craft store. How was she doing this?

"…and never ever let him anywhere near a sports shop if you want to keep his attention," Tsukino said as they rode the escalator of the very expensive department store. "But he's even worse in the arcade by the pier with the hoop game. He spends hours winning as many tokens as he can just to buy up all the crayfish memorabilia. Are you writing this down?"

"Why would I need to write this down?" Kise asked, utterly bewildered as he trudged behind her, weighed down by shopping bags. "_How_ am I supposed to write this all down?" he asked, raising an arm hanging with three bags full of popsicle sticks, presumably bought for some nefarious purpose.

"Don't blame me if you make a fool of yourself the first time you meet Aomine…kun," said Tsukino. He sighed in defeat. "There's a notepad and pen in the _Craft Craft Craft_ bag," she added helpfully.

"Thanks."

They came to a stop in front of the makeup stands. One of the makeup artists, who was showing an elderly lady what shade of concealer she would need, waved at Kise who instantly brightened up and he waved back. Her name was Goto Natsumi and her face stood as a true testament to the skills of makeup technicians everywhere; smoky eyes blended to perfection, contours stroked on as if by Pythagoras himself, and lips a deep shade of plum red that would have had roses wilting out of shame.

Kise had known Goto since around the time he'd gotten scouted, back when his sister was still ferrying him from audition to audition waiting for his break out moment. Goto had been at one of the venues helping her aunty do the makeup for the models and upon seeing Kise grabbed hold of his face and began cooing over his bone structure. And then she smacked him over the head and berated him for not having a proper skin care routine (_because_ _good god look at those pores), _and they'd been friends ever since.

"Ryou-chan!"

Goto bounced over and threw her arms around Kise's neck swinging him about like a rag doll, which was impressive when you considered that she had to stand on her tiptoes to reach him.

"_Natsumicchi,"_ spluttered Kise, clawing at the thick trunk-like arms cutting off his circulations. Goto was a big girl and also very strong and Kise folded like a piece of paper. _"You're going to kill me."_

"Oops!" she said with a giggle, freeing him. "I always forget how small you are."

"I'm not small!" shouted Kise, yanking his sleeve up. "Look at these muscles, Natsumicchi. Eh, eh! _Muscles!_"

"Tsk, tsk," said Goto, shaking her head. "So petulant Ryou-chan. Young middle schoolers really have too much fire in their hearts."

"_I'm only a year younger than you! _You're_ a middle schooler!"_

"And what a vast difference that year makes," said Goto, placing the back of her hand on her forehead and swooning. Kise dropped his bags to catch her but she spun out of his reach. "With so many fragile male egos, what kind of romantic prospects are there for intellectuals like me?"

"Guess you'll just have to die alone, Natsumicchi," Kise said darkly.

"Hmm… Dying alone… is the new black," said Goto, rubbing her chin thoughtfully. "I should put that on a t-shirt."

"Last week the new black was binge-watching Netflix and eating instant noodles," muttered Kise, shooting her an annoyed look as he picked up the bags. She returned it with a glorious smile. "Anyway," continued Kise, looking away. "I need to buy some concealer. I keep getting break outs in my T-zone which is weird because-"

"_Oooh_ _who is this?_" asked Goto, swerving on Tsukino, who had been standing there watching the entire spectacle with wide-eyed wonder. "I'm Goto Natsumi. Nice to meet you."

"_Natsumicchi! Don't ignore me!"_

Tsukino opened her mouth to speak but no words came out. A pink blush spread over her cheeks and she clamped her mouth shut again.

"Ryou-chan," said Goto, bending over to smile at Tsukino who was a head shorter than she was, "your cute friend won't talk to me."

"Can you blame Tsukino-san? With that much bronzer, Natsumicchi looks like an overbaked potato," said Kise, smirking to himself in a self-congratulatory way. "_Clowns_ would be terrified of you."

"Only the most fragile of male egos would go after a woman's artistic self-expression," said Goto. "You disappoint me, Ryou-chan."

Tsukino nodded in agreement.

"Don't be like that, Natsumichii, I'm only trying to help," said Kise, adopting the tone of a wise old man who didn't believe in climate change. "I mean of course your makeup skills are amazing, but there's always room for improvement."

"Choose your next words carefully, Ryou-chan."

"Well have you ever thought about a more natural look? You know men don't like girls who lay it on too thick. I can give you some tips if you want…"

"So back to you, Tsukino-san," said Goto, leaning down again and fluttering her thick eyelashes coquettishly at Tsukino. "I come in peace."

Off to the side, Kise was still talking to himself. _"…some of the girls I work with use…"_

"I'm not afraid of you," said Tsukino, her blush deepening.

"Great," said Goto, grinning wider.

"…_too much will make your skin age. Body positivity is great and everything but you have to keep in mind…"_

"I'm Tsukino Kame."

"Nice to meet you, Tsukino Kame."

"… _honestly, I'm shocked you didn't come to me before…"_

"Your makeup…" said Tsukino.

"Mhmm."

"Can you teach me how to do makeup like that?"

"OI! Have you both just been ignoring me this whole time?" shouted Kise.

"I warn you, I charge a very expensive fee," said Goto, grabbing Tsukino by the shoulder and bouncing her quite without resistance over to her mother's makeup stand. "But I promise I'm worth it."

"Kise will pay for it," said Tsukino, sitting down on the stool and watching reverently as Goto began plucking different bottles and tubes out of miniature drawers.

"_I'll pay for what?"_

"So," said Goto, holding up a bottle to Tsukino's face, "you have an olive complexion. Let's start you with the J5X for concealer. I think your skin is still a little too young for foundation. Oooh, if Kise is paying then we can use the deluxe range."

"Ooh, deluxe range."

"Hey, what happened to Ryou-chan?" demanded Kise.

"_Ryou-chan_ decided he was going to wear a particularly ugly shade of _Mansplaining Misogyny_ today and lecture me about a skill I've been honing since before he even knew what toner was," said Goto, throwing another glorious smile over her shoulder. Kise opened his mouth to argue but could not. "So _Kise_ can go sit in the corner and think about his actions."

So while Tsukino was taught all about the wonderful ways of makeup, Kise sat in the corner and thought about his actions.

* * *

Kise and Tsukino walked to the train station in silence, broken every now and again by Kise letting out a long drawn out sigh. Tsukino was too busy trying to catch glimpses of her reflection in passing windows to care that Kise had not said a word since Goto had banished him to a stool in the homeware department. When it came to the bill he had simply offered up his wallet and all its contents before returning to his stool to sulk. There was a brief glimmer of hope in his eyes as they left and Goto came bouncing after them, but she had only forgotten to give Tsukino her loyalty punch card and left without so much as a glance in his direction. Of course, Tsukino noticed none of this as she had been admiring her blurry face in the side of a shiny bin.

Reaching the turnstiles still in a state of mutual inattention the pair was almost bulldozed over by the four o'clock rush. Clawing their way to the side, they flattened themselves against the wall as they waited for it to pass.

"Ugh, this is so stupid! I shouldn't care what Natsumicchi thinks!" Kise groaned loudly. "It's not my fault if she can't take friendly advice. Right?! Right?!"

Tsukino looked at Kise for the first time since they'd stepped into the makeup department. There was an odd expression on his face as he glared up at the ceiling, one that she was familiar with. It made her uncomfortable and she looked away.

"I didn't… I didn't even mean it. Natsumicchi's makeup skills are the best I've ever seen," Kise muttered quietly. "Why the hell did I even say that?"

"Mama Tsukino told me that I say things that I don't mean because I don't want people to know what I really think," said Tsukino.

"Ah," Kise found himself saying, unsure of how to react to such honesty from Teiko's most accomplished liar.

"See…. I used to have this friend who I made fun of all the time," Tsukino continued, staring at her feet. "I'd call her short, and slow, and fat because it used to make me feel better that she was worse at basketball than I was. Then she had a growth spurt. Suddenly she wasn't short, or slow, or fat anymore and she could play basketball better than anyone I'd ever seen. I kept trying to put her down though. Like… worse than before. I thought maybe if I made her believe she was pathetic she would stick around."

When Tsukino looked up Kise was staring at her with a different expression, one she was not familiar with. It too made her uncomfortable and she looked away.

"All I'm trying to say is that it's not what you say that hurts them," said Tsukino, shrugging her shoulders and heading towards the turnstiles. "It's the fact that you're trying to hurt them in the first place."

Before she could touch her pass down, she felt a tap on her shoulder. There was a smirk on Kise's face as he handed over her many bags and she was reminded again of Zinan. For once it didn't make her stomach turn.

"You know, I'm no Natsumicchi but if you ever want help picking clothes or makeup, you can always come to me. I had no idea you were interested in fashion," said Kise, winking as they passed through the barriers together. "I have a lot of friends in _the industry_ so I can get you a good price." Kise said _the industry_ like it was an exclusive club made for people who pooped bars of gold.

"I need new bras," said Tsukino, looking down at her breasts. "Padded bras. Really padded bras."

"Give me your email," said Kise, pulling out his phone. "I'm going to spam you with body positivity posts."

"Eh? What's body positivity?" asked Tsukino.

Kise shook his head. "Actually, I'm just going to give you Natsumicchi's number… she's better at this stuff than I am," he admitted, a small smile on his face. Taking Tsukino's phone he inputted Goto's contact details as well as his mobile, email, pager, and home phone number, assigned himself a personal ring tone and finished off with a candid contact picture selfie of him holding up the peace sign and pouting. "There. Now Tsukinocchi will always know when I'm calling."

Tsukino stared at his contact picture. "I'm not interested in booty calls."

"_I didn't mean it like that, you pervert!"_

"Just making sure," Tsukino said with an awkward grin, scratching the back of her neck. "I'm still working on the whole saying things I don't mean thing."

Kise extended a hand. "Let's work on it together."

Taking his hand, Tsukino blew a long, wet raspberry.

"Let's work… really, really hard."

The train arrived and Tsukino paused before getting on.

"You should apologise to Goto-sensei," she said. "She'll probably forgive you because you're rich and have contacts in _the industry_. Plus… she's nice."

Kise laughed and shook his head. "Probably," he said. "And I bet she'll probably forgive you too. Your friend."

The crowd began to move forcing Tsukino onto the train before she could reply.

Unfortunately, Oshiro wasn't the forgiving type. And after everything that had happened, Tsukino knew that a simple sorry from either of them wasn't going to fix things.

The train started to move leaving Kise behind. Shoulder pressed up against the window she waved at him and wondered if she had made another new friend and felt grateful at the thought. Kise waved back, pulled out his phone and pointed meaningfully at it. When she checked her own she saw that she had received about fifteen messages from Aomine asking why she was late and one from Kise.

_You owe me 30,000 yen, freeloader._

Yeah, so? She owed Kuroko fifty thousand and counting.

* * *

Aomine was not a happy bunny. Aomine was the kind of bunny that frothed at the mouth as you tearfully went to fetch the shotgun from father's shed. Pacing the entrance to the stadium, the young man watched enviously as fans laughed and chatted happily around him. They had not suffered the betrayal of a late companion. They had not been left without tickets and could go in and out as they pleased. They had not been standing in the cold for an hour watching as their fingertips turned the same colour as their hair. A large fountain sat in the middle of the square and Aomine stared at it wondering how deep it was and how long one could hold someone else's head under water before it could be considered attempted murder.

It was another ten minutes before a much smaller than average figure appeared on the other side of the square. Aomine was about to run over and drag it by the curls but something made him freeze. There was a permanent look of uncomprehending on his face as Tsukino arrived in front of him, arms hanging with bags.

"I bought you Teriyaki burgers. If you hit me I'll throw them in the fountain and then I'll eat the tickets. Also I hid the tickets in my underwear," said Tsukino, eyes narrowing as the odd expression on Aomine's face persisted. "What's up with your face?"

"You're wearing makeup," said Aomine, pressing his lips together in a strange smile.

"Yeah so," said Tsukino, waltzing passed him with an unaffected air. "It's my _artistic expression_."

Tsukino flinched as Aomine burst out laughing but she squared her shoulders and kept walking.

"It looks weird," he said once he'd calmed down, reaching a hand towards the bag with the burgers. "Doesn't suit you."

"Yeah, well, I like it," Tsukino muttered, handing the tickets over to the inspector. Having seen where they had come from the inspector waved them inside quickly.

"So what, now you wear makeup? What's next? Gonna start buying lacy underwear like Satsuki and drawing love hearts on your homework book."

"Why do you care?" asked Tsukino, shoving inelegantly passed other spectators in search of their seats.

"Next you're gonna grow out your hair and pretend you're a real girl."

"Right."

"Wait! Is this why you were so late? Because you were playing dress up," said Aomine, reaching for another burger. "The hell, Tsukino! I was waiting for an hour!"

"The match hasn't even started yet."

"We've missed all of the pre-game stuff!"

"_Who cares!"_ shouted Tsukino.

Aomine fell silent. He realised then that Tsukino was making that same face that always made him uneasy, the one she'd made after they'd fought outside of Tayama's gardening shed.

"Tsukino," he started to say, but they had reached their seats and he found himself unable to speak in the face of the redhaired giants that stood up to let them get to their seats.

"Kame," greeted a stern looking man with a shock of bright red hair and thin eyes that made Tsukino's parentage unquestionable. He turned to Aomine and shook his hand. "And you must be Kame's boyfriend."

"He's not my boyfriend," Tsukino snapped, shoving passed her mother and planting herself in the empty seat furthest away. Aomine stared after her with a look of shock.

"Ah…uh we're classmates," Aomine explained, his mouth dry. "I'm Aomine Daiki. Nice to meet you."

"Tsukino Gekkou. Nice to meet you too." Tsukino's father glanced from Aomine to Tsukino who looked like she had just been told she could not throw rabbit droppings off the roof of the senior centre where Old Lady Sumitimo went on Fridays. "Kame, there better not be any fireworks in those bags."

"It's food," said Tsukino, sinking deeper into her chair.

"You better not be planning to throw any of that food at Zinan."

"What if he looks hungry?"

"_Kame!"_

"I was joking," she said mirthlessly.

"You must be Saburo," said Aomine, shaking hands with the young man who was almost Akashi's height. "Thanks for all the lunches, man."

"It's no problem," Saburo said in a soft voice. "I enjoy making them."

It was harder to see a resemblance between Tsukino and her brother. Other than the curls they had completely different faces. While Tsukino had a tan complexion and sharp features, Saburo was as white as a sheet with large droopy eyes and a small, pillowy mouth. The word delicate came to mind.

"Well, Aomine-kun, you better take a seat down there by my wife, Beniko. The match is about to start," said Gekkou.

As Aomine sat down between Tsukino and her mother it became clear who Saburo got his looks from. Beniko like the rest of the family was very tall, very sturdy and had very red hair. Unlike the rest of her family however she wore her curls to her ankles, smelled like freshly baked cookies, and reminded Aomine of a naïve young mermaid who cannot be mentioned here for copyright reasons. There was also a redhaired baby on her lap gurgling and reaching over Aomine to grab at Tsukino. Number Five, thought Aomine, wondering if he'd ever learn his real name.

"Aomine-kun, wasn't it?" greeted Beniko, beaming at Aomine with the sort of smile that made him think of sunshine and angels. "What a handsome young man my Kame-chan has brought home."

"He's not my boyfriend," snapped her daughter.

"I know, I know," said Beniko, shifting the baby, who seemed determined to reach his older sister onto her other shoulder. "But you hardly ever bring friends to meet the family. In fact, I can't even remember the last time I saw Tetsu-chan."

"That disloyal worm is dead to me," said Tsukino.

"Tetsu-chan is dead to Kame-chan at least twice a year," Beniko said to Aomine. "Last time it was because Tetsu-chan had failed to perform lookout duty correctly and she got caught stealing her eldest brother's por-"

"_Mama!"_

"Sorry, sorry, I always forget how sensitive you are about your plotting," said Beniko. "So how do you and Kame-chan know each other. I mean I know you're in the same class but surely there's a story behind how you became friends."

"Ah," said Aomine, glancing at Tsukino staring angrily at the court as the players warmed up. "Not really, we just… get along."

Beniko gave Aomine a long, thoughtful look. "Well, I have to say Kame-chan always has excellent taste in friends so I look forward to getting to know you."

And then Beniko popped out one of her breasts and shoved it into the mouth of the infant whining in her arms. Luckily Aomine had several aunties who openly breast fed around him and as such did not break out in a pitiful whimper and excuse himself to go hide in the nearest toilet cubicle like Saburo did. The game started and Aomine was up in his seat leaning over the railing to watch as Kaijou immediately began dominating the court totally immersed in the play. At least that's what he told himself as he snuck glances behind him at the sullen hobgoblin playing Tetris on her phone.

The first quarter came to an end and Aomine sat back down. By now Beniko had finished breast feeding and Tsukino's father had managed to drag Saburo back to his seat. They were currently engaged in a colourful discussion about how the young man was going to have to get over his fear of breasts soon because their cousins were coming over to stay and the house couldn't afford to have one of the bathrooms put out of commission by Saburo's neuroses. It was either that or the youngest brother would have to go and hide in the garden shed, which was full of spiders, which he was also terrified of because his older siblings had thought it would be funny to dress up like giant spiders and attack him in the middle of the night when he was three.

"Looks like Kaijou's gonna win," Aomine told Tsukino, fishing out his fourth burger from the carrier bag. "Zinan-senpai scored-"

She grunted.

"Oh and they got a first year, Kasamatsu Yukio filling in for Ichiro-senpai as point-guard," continued Aomine. "For such a young guy he's really holding his own. Gawako's line-up is totally made up of third years so I was surprised Kaijou put him in there."

"Huh."

"I don't know if I'd have the stamina to go up against them. It's hard enough with us second years competing in practise matches against third years in middle school. Who knows what it'll be like when we get to high school."

"Who knows."

"Ah man, it gets me all fired up just thinking about it."

"Hmm."

Was this the silent treatment? Aomine wondered to himself as he absentmindedly swallowed a seventh burger without tasting it. Had he done something wrong?

There was a tap on his shoulder and Aomine turned to Beniko, who quickly placed a finger to her lips. Pointing to her phone she showed him the screen.

_Why is Kame-chan upset with you?_

Aomine shrugged his shoulders.

_Did you say something to upset her?_

Aomine shrugged again.

_Did you say something about her being a boy?_

Aomine froze. Then he grabbed his own phone and began typing furiously.

_I joked about her wearing makeup._

Beniko shook her head and began typing. When she was finished the match was getting ready to start up again but Aomine was too absorbed with reading the message to notice, his expression growing more troubled as time went on. When he finally passed the phone back to Beniko there was stiffness in his movements.

"Ah, sorry, I need some air," said Aomine, standing up suddenly.

Tsukino looked up from her phone but made no move to follow him.

"You should go and see if he's okay," said Beniko, yanking Number Five back as he leapt towards Tsukino with dogged perseverance.

"I'm alright, thanks."

From behind Beniko's shoulder, the portentous head of her father loomed forwards and fixed Tsukino with a thunderous glare. _"You should go and see if he's okay."_

"Tch, Papa Tsukino," Beniko chided sweetly, "I'm sure Kame-chan can make her own decisions. It's the only way she'll develop any independence."

"She's going to independently do what we say," said Gekkou, reaching into his coat and pulling out a familiar DVD case. "Or else the pretty boy gets it."

Tsukino was off like a shot.

* * *

Where had this basketball idiot gone to? Tsukino thought as she searched frantically for the blue-haired giraffe. Completing her third circuit around the building, Tsukino decided to give in and go accept her punishment. If she was clever about it she was sure she could negotiate the release of her DVDs if she offered to babysit Number Five while Mama Tsukino and Papa Tsukino had date night and probably, because they liked having to ration food like they were in communist Russia, conceive Number Six.

Just as she was about to slink back into the stands something hooked around her neck and dragged her out into the square.

"Aomine, just what do you think you're doing," said Tsukino, kicking at his shins and punching his thighs with no effect.

Depositing Tsukino beside the fountain Aomine stepped back, kicked off his shoes and held up his hands in surrender.

"First hear what I have to say," said Aomine. "Those are my limited-edition Bounce Grade Jordans. If you don't like what you hear you can toss them in the fountain. Promise."

"How about I toss them in the fountain now and then leg it to your house for your pet cicadas," hissed Tsukino, holding the shoes over the water. "Except I'll toss them in a vat of boiling oil."

From his rucksack Aomine pulled out a pretty pink shopping bag that Tsukino recognised from one of the boutiques down the road and placed it on the side of the fountain. Eyeing him suspiciously she put the shoes down and looked inside the bag.

"I had to call Satsuki and ask her which ones were good. I mean you might already have one but apparently you can never have too many. But Satsuki says that about everything," Aomine said, rubbing the back of his neck. "Look, I'm really sorry about how I always say you're not a girl and stuff. I don't mean it. I mean what do I know about being a girl anyway."

Unfurling the reams of tissue paper, Tsukino lifted out the blue makeup bag and unzipped it. Inside there were two smaller matching makeup bags and some lipsticks which were all varying shades of red. She imagined him grabbing a fist full of the first five he saw while the shop assistant looked on in impotent horror.

"Satsuki also said it was impolite to give someone a bag without something inside it. Lipstick was the only one I knew," explained Aomine, shuffling his shoeless feet. "Ah, say something, Tsukino. You're making this weird."

"You missed most of the match," said Tsukino, putting her gift back in its shopping bag. "Like it's gonna end in five minutes."

"Yeah," said Aomine, glancing back at the stadium. "Well, you wanna go eat something? I saw a burger place down the road. It's on me."

"You just ate like ten burgers."

"Yeah so?"

"You sure you don't wanna wait behind and talk to the team?" asked Tsukino. "I bet Zi-nii could probably introduce you to the coach; you know, if you were thinking about going to Kaijou. I mean you did come all this way to see him."

"Nah, it's alright," said Aomine, grinning. "Plus, I know where you live. I can come over and talk to Zinan-senpai anytime I want."

"_Zinan-senpai, Zinan-senpai, Zinan-senpai. _Honestly, don't you have any shame?" said Tsukino, glaring at him. "You sound like a faithful lapdog."

"Hey, I don't want to hear that from Miss_. Akashi-san-make-sure-you-stretch-properly-or-you'll-injure-your-perfectly-sculpted-legs_," Aomine said in a rather accurate falsetto.

"I think that statement says a lot more about the way you see Akashi-san than it does about me," said Tsukino. Her eyes widened. "Are you in love with Akashi-san? Are you leaving me for him? And after all that planning we did for our wedding. Think about the baby!"

Wringing his hair Aomine jabbed his finger at her. "How many times do I have to tell you we are not getting married!"

People who had been milling about stopped to stare at the couple airing their dirty laundry in the middle of the square, especially when on the outside of things it looked like a much taller, older teenage boy accosting a much smaller younger girl who was on the verge of tears.

"_How could you do this to me? How could you do this to little Kaiki!"_

"_The BLEEP is Kaiki!"_

And now they were talking about babies and marriage. What kind of a terrible human being was this man? One particularly concerned citizen went to fetch security.

"Look what you've done," Aomine hissed as the security guard blustered towards them.

"Hey, Aomine, how fast do you think you can run without shoes on?"

Aomine stared at the small girl. "Don't-"

But it was too late. Tsukino picked up his shoes and ran in the opposite direction.

Apparently, the answer was still very fast.

* * *

"I don't get it!" shouted Kise, pointing at Kuroko who was stretching behind him. "Why is he a regular?"

"Hey don't point," said Aomine, scratching his underarm. "It's rude."

"If me and him played against each other, who would win, huh?"

"Well… you."

"_Then why the hell-"_

"You're not getting it," said Aomine, grinning knowingly at the newest member of the first string. "He's different from you and me. And he's totally reliable in a game. You'll see how amazing he is soon enough."

Kise did not look convinced.

"Kuroko, Kise," said Midorima, walking over to them. "Orders from the coach. You'll be joining the second-string for their practice game tomorrow."

"Second string. How come?" asked Kise.

"For insurance," explained Midorima with a grave expression. "It's common here for first string players to help out in second and third string games. Remember, the most important thing in Teiko is-"

"Oi, tsundere, where the hell did you put my head?" bellowed a familiar voice. "I have to go practise with the dance club in ten minutes."

Kise's eyes went wide as he took in the sight of Tsukino Kame clad in Teiko's demon mascot uniform stomping over to Midorima.

"This is the sixth time I have told you not to call me that," said Midorima.

"Where is my head, tsundere?" asked Tsukino. "You know I don't like walking around in the costume without it. What if someone outside of the first string comes in and sees me, huh? Their blood will be on your hands."

"I haven't seen it."

"Liar. I saw you cleaning it yesterday."

"A team's mascot is an important part of their identity and morale. I was only cleaning it to ensure the success-"

"Liar. You were cleaning it because I kept complaining about how bad it smelled. Now where's my head?"

"I took it to get dry cleaned. It will be ready for tomorrow. In the meantime I have a motorcycle helmet in the shape of a frog in my locker in case of emergencies. You may use that for your dance practice if you need to."

"Tsukinocchi is the Demon of the First-String Gymnasium?" asked Kise.

"Tsukinocchi?" repeated Aomine.

"Oh hey, Kise," saidTsukino, raising a paw in greeting. "Congratulations on joining the first string. If you tell anyone about me I'll sneak into your house in the middle of the night and shave off your hair."

Aomine looked between them in confusion. "How do you know each other?"

"Don't worry, Aomine," said Tsukino. "I've made it clear to Kise that I'm not interested in having relations with him."

"Why the hell would I care who you had relations with?" snapped Aomine.

"Wait a minute," said Kise. "Aren't you two dating?"

"No! And we're not getting married, and she isn't pregnant with my child. Jheeze."

"How can you treat Kaiki-chan so callously?" asked Tsukino.

"For the hundredth time, we are not naming our baby _Kaiki!"_

"So you admit we are having a baby."

Aomine groaned.

"What the hell do you mean you're not dating, Tsukinocchi?" said Kise, jabbing an accusative finger at Tsukino. "You told me you were in love!"

"Don't point at your seniors," said Midorima.

"_She's the mascot!"_

"A team's mascot is an important part of their identity and morale-"

"Just admit you're defending my honour, tsundere."

"What was all that about me needing your approval if I wanted to get to know Aomine-kun then? Thirty thousand yen! I spent thirty thousand yen on you!"

"There is no honour left to defend."

"Ah, so that's why you were late to the match on Saturday," said Aomine, glaring at Tsukino. "Did Kise buy all those burgers too?"

"No, I paid for them myself."

Aomine stared at her.

"Okay, I took the money from Ichi-nii's wallet. But I only took what I felt I was owed."

"Wait, you two went to see a match together?" asked Kise.

"Yeah."

"So you are dating?"

"Yes."

"Shut up, Tsukino!"

* * *

**Author's Note:**

This was probably the trickiest chapter I've ever written for this story (which is way it took aaaages). Kise is such a tricky character to write. I hope he came across believable. The next few chapters are already planned but not written out. They're also pretty tricky since we've got the whole gang together now so the hi-jinks may take some writing. Loved the reviews guessing who Tsukino would traumatise next. I did consider having Tsukino meet Kasamatsu but it didn't come up organically so I couldn't sadly.

Also I hope Aomine and Tsukino's 'heartfelt' moment at the end came across believable as well. I was originally going to make it waaaaay more dramatic but I think it's still too early for that shizz. Also if anyone's feeling insecure about their body or what it means to be a girl while reading this I really do hope you know that make-up or no make-up, small breasts, big breasts, medium breasts, short, fat, skinny, or tall you are still worthy as fudge and deserve all the love you can get. As does Tsukino so she's gonna get a bit more respect in terms of appearance hopefully from Aomine (and everyone else) from now on. Dw this is still all about humour but I wanted body positivity to be a part of that!


End file.
